


i dreamt about you nearly every night this week

by shoulderbladesarewings



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: 'gfs' i should say, Alternate Universe - High School, Angst, Blow Jobs, Harry Flirts, Light BDSM, M/M, Self-Esteem Issues, Sex Toys, Smut, Teacher-Student Relationship, Therapy, also lol cos i wrote this when the original gfs were still in the picture, and harry kinda sleeps with people for money but it's not as clean-cut as that, and want vs need vs love, anyway, caroline flack is a philosophy teacher, dub-con?, except it's british, i mean idk, it's partly an exploration of the nature of consent, it's very fluff-less sadly, niall is irish, so secondary school, the sex comes later on, zayn is a bit of a control freak
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-20
Updated: 2015-12-14
Packaged: 2018-05-02 13:19:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 44,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5249609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shoulderbladesarewings/pseuds/shoulderbladesarewings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis is in therapy because Harry ruined his life. Love and sex and friendship are explosive if you mix them wrong. Harry is living proof that practise doesn't make perfect.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. To Be Underage And Drunk Off Your Eyes

**Author's Note:**

> so i wrote this about a year ago but i'm tweaking it as i update so it's still officially In Progress. if anyone wants to beta that'd be much appreciated. otherwise, hope you like it

The first thing that Louis told his therapist, when she asked for the story, was that he’d known he was good looking before he met Harry Styles.

   Frankly, it would have been intrinsically unfair if he wasn’t good looking. He’d been on a diet since he was twelve and a daily beauty regime since he was eight. He spent the money he made working at the local chip shop on the most expensive hair products and lotions he could get his hands on; he knew what clothes suited him and he wore them with pride; he looked in the mirror most mornings and _knew_ he was good looking. He _knew_ it.

   But my first sight of my new classmate threw into question all but everything he’d ever thought he knew about himself, or the universe in general. Especially forces of attraction. And gravity.

   But when thinking of the past, he backtracks a bit. It’s tempting to begin his story the moment he laid eyes on Harry Styles because he came to pretty much define the second where his life began. But, he thinks, it’s probably healthy to remind himself that, in fact, he did have a life, and a personality, and a sense of himself, before him. That he could exist without him. That maybe, therefore, he still can.

   So he begins with the morning of the day they met. That doesn’t sound like a lot of time to convince himself of his existential worth outside of Harry, but one thing he has learnt from him is that a couple of hours can be a lifetime. An excruciating, agonising, unbearable lifetime.

   It was six o’clock on a winter’s day, that ungodly hour when the world hasn’t quite woken up yet and the buses skate alone along the narrow streets, and it’s the absolute best time of day to pretend that one is an American spy on an undercover mission. Which, naturally, was exactly what Louis was doing. ‘Right Malik, the boys at HQ have only given us two guns for this mission and I’m going to need both of them for intimidation. That means you’ll have to stay behind me at all times, got it?’

   His best friend, Zayn, was giving him a very sleepy and decidedly unimpressed look, which he was somehow managing to do with his eyes almost completely shut. ‘Wake me up when we get there.’

   ‘OK Malik, but – oh my God! Snipers!’

   Zayn didn’t even bother to sit up. ‘If they were snipers you wouldn’t be able to see them.’

   ‘You forget, human logic does not apply to the great master of espionage, Louis Tomlinson!’

   ‘And they would have shot you by now. I don’t suppose that imagination of yours could conjure up a reason for you to shut up and let me get some sleep?’

   Louis pretended to think. ‘Well…I suppose they could have bugged us. In which case I’d talk only in sign language.’

   ‘Works for me.’

   ‘OK. Give me your hand. I think I still remember how to do this stuff.’

   After an extremely long-suffering pause, Zayn held out his hand. Louis happily stroked swear words into his skin until he got bored and just held it. And he’d thought that Zayn was asleep but apparently not because he felt his fingers tighten around his own.

   They had a weird relationship, Zayn and Louis. Like brothers, although Louis doubted brothers had to deal with this constant undercurrent of – most likely sexual – tension. Then again he wouldn’t know, being blessed with four sisters. Although Niall does in fact have experience in the fraternal department and he vehemently assures Louis that they do not.

   Technically, Zayn was mad at him. Normally he’d be more willing to humour Louis in his endeavours to make life a little more interesting. But ever since Louis had earned that scholarship to Saint Jacobs, alongside him, he’d been unashamedly bitter over the fact that he’d worked his arse off since Year 3 to get where he was now, while Louis had only started taking school seriously about six months ago. There wasn’t really anything Louis could say to his frustration except _‘I’m smart. You’re beautiful’._

   Which, he might point out, was absolutely true. Even here on the bus at 6am, when Zayn had obviously rolled out of bed less than fifteen minutes ago, with his bottle-top glasses and crumbs of croissant around his mouth, he was effortlessly, stunningly beautiful. And he had an English scholarship to one of the poshest private schools in the country. As far as Louis was concerned, he had nothing to complain about.

   But it wasn’t like they were really fighting. Hell, he’d come around to Louis’s house that morning and without preamble handed over half of the expensive stationary his mum had ordered for him. Then he’d given him a brief pep talk, which began with _‘Three lunchtimes a week in the library’_ and ended with _‘No pranks’._ Louis swore that boy was more invested in his education than he was.

   Except that Louis would be invested this year. To make his mum happy. To set his sisters a good example. To show both of his loser fathers that he didn’t need them in his life to make something out of himself.

   So, for the time being at least, he promised himself that he would buckle down properly. No distractions. No messing about. And no pranks.

   Although he did have to admit that it nearly killed him to refrain from drawing a dick on his sleeping best friend’s obnoxiously perfect face.

 

*

Louis’s first sight of Harry Styles can be best compared to the feeling of finding one’s favourite song in someone else’s otherwise awful playlist. He and Zayn were sitting in the common room they’d been ushered into, on a brand new blue sofa, eyeing the foosball table and vending machines with uncertainty. The place was big enough to hold a bloody ball in, nothing like the cosy little living room they’d used to hang out in with the 6th formers at their old school and had been looking forward to having the run of by Year 13. No one could ever have the run of this place. It was just too big.

   They were sitting in silence with the other new kids, most of whom were either muttering to each other in Russian or poring over the complimentary copies of the school magazine they’d been handed at Reception, studiously memorising the names of the faculty. Zayn had warned Louis not to speak to him in case he sent him to sleep, and to be honest Louis didn’t feel much like speaking. His stomach was starting to churn.

   As the time ticked closer to registration, a few other students began trickling in. They had the air of seasoned ‘old boys’ who’d been here their whole lives and still felt just a little bit like they were breaking the rules coming into their own common room. Most of them would ignore the new students, or nod a little before buying a cardboard cup of coffee from the machine and spreading themselves out over a beanbag or sofa. As more gathered they started to make loud use of the foosball table, and Louis watched with envy. He wanted to saunter over and start talking; grab a coffee; cheer on the blues; blend in like he would have done in any other situation from youth group to babysitting. But something about their accents stopped him: drawling and lazy, all vowels and good breeding and private education. Louis didn’t want to open his mouth in case they heard his East End upbringing and turned away, or asked if he needed a summer job cleaning their father’s yacht. He’d go red, he knew it, or even lose his temper, and he’d just promised Zayn that he’d be good. So he stayed put.

   Then it happened. _He_ walked in.

   Louis’s favourite song at that time was _Why’d You Only Call Me When You’re High,_ and it suited the other boy so perfectly it might as well have been written on his suntanned skin. He had a mane of curly hair and two dimples even deeper than his dark green eyes. His shirt was untucked, but it looked more careless than deliberate, unlike the other idiots with their painstakingly rolled up sleeves and ruffled hair. He looked dashingly windswept, and Louis liked it. He brought to mind exotic countries he’d never been to and beaches and oceans he’d never see. He smelt of money and cologne, instead of chips and smoke. He was everything that Louis didn’t have, and way too much of what he wanted. He was gorgeous. Statuesque. Beautiful.

   Then he held out his hand to the girl beside Louis, opened his mouth – and began to speak fluent French. The girl looked just as surprised as Louis, but she responded readily and just like that they were nattering away in a language Louis could barely speak twenty words of. His mouth was open too, but nothing was coming out of it.

   He was so gobsmacked that he barely noticed the bleached-blond boy beside him until he grabbed his hand to shake it vigorously. ‘Hey, newbie. What’s the craic?’

   Louis liked him instantly. He was the only one so far who didn’t sound like everyone in his family had gone to Eton. He had an Irish accent as thick as custard with a reassuring working-class tilt to his words and he put him at ease, distracting him temporarily from his spellbinding partner and the smooth, soft words spilling from his bitten-red lips. ‘Not much. You?’

   He extended his arms, grinning with a set of teeth that had clearly never seen braces. Louis found myself wondering if he was another scholarship student. ‘We’re the welcoming committee. Well, Harry is. I’ve been conscripted against my will.’ He laughed from somewhere inside his stomach that practically echoed with its depth. ‘No offence.’ He gave Zayn a somewhat more appraising smile, and it was to him that he addressed his next words. ‘I’m Niall.’

   ‘Zayn,’ Louis’s friend said quietly, before inclining his head to swing the attention back toward him. ‘He’s Louis.’

   ‘I am indeed,’ Louis declared proudly.

   And of course, his massive, overconfident voice snagged the attention of the gorgeous guy next to Niall, who looked over at him with sparkling eyes and a small, intrigued smile that somehow brought out the brackets in his cheeks in all their adorable glory. ‘Hello.’

   Louis could physically feel his face go up in flames. ‘Hi.’

   ‘That’s our Hazza,’ Niall said, clapping him on the back. ‘Fluent in French, German and Russian.’

   The boy blushed a little, brushing his fringe away from his forehead. ‘I’ve lived everywhere,’ he explained, for some reason fixing his gaze on Louis. ‘Being a nomad has its perks. You’re…Louis?’

   ‘Yep.’

   ‘And you’re Zayn.’ He beamed widely, his blinding teeth hitting both of them square in the face. ‘Neat name. You too, Lou. S’OK if I call you Lou, yeah?’

   Ordinarily Louis would have snapped back instantly with something smart-arse like _‘No, only my friends call me Lou’_ although in fact no one had ever called him Lou in his life.Difficult was his middle name after all. But for some reason the only answers that presented themselves were _‘Yes’_ and _‘Huh?’_ and after about an eternity, he chose the former.

 

*

It turned out that Harry was in Louis’s class, and Niall in Zayn’s. Harry stuck with Louis all day, and somehow managed to keep chattering for the entirety of it, until Louis was dangerously close to kissing him just to shut him up. He’d never known a school where almost everyone looked, sounded, and indeed was exactly the same could have so many stories. He learnt about how their English teacher was in the middle of a messy divorce and often asked his pupils to babysit for him when he had the kids so he could – supposedly – go speed-dating, and how the Geography teacher had been hastily replaced six months ago after rumour had spread to the staffroom about his _extremely_ close relationship with the Deputy Head boy, and about the tiny hole in the wall of the locker room which they were pretty sure adjoined directly to the gym teacher’s office.

   At one point, Louis managed to pluck up the courage to ask what the general policy was on gays.

   Harry laughed with the unadulterated delight of a child told that his new pet comes with detachable wings. ‘Are you? Awesome! I’m bisexual, and no one really cares. Just try not to stare.’ He winked. ‘I’m afraid I do tend to. Although to be honest, no one in our year has ever really…caught my eye.’

   Louis nearly walked into the banister.

   It was a relief to know that no one was going to give him shit, no matter how pissed off he was starting to get at this boy and his stupid eyes and his stupid smile and his moronic fucking dimples. He’d already been through the coming out process once. He would have really preferred it not to be an issue.

   He explained this to Harry in short words and the other boy nodded studiously. ‘Sure. Don’t worry, I’ll let it be known. What about your friend? What’s he?’

   ‘Closeted questioning. Breathe a word and we’ll both kill you but I’ll get there first.’

   ‘Noted. What made him rethink?’

   ‘Me,’ Louis replied, candid as ever.

   The little fucker gave him the slowest, most intense once-over he’d ever experienced – Louis felt his dick twitch in his trousers as Harry’s eyes swept over it – and then calmly concluded ‘I can see why that might happen.’

   ‘Do you?’ Louis deadpanned as they ducked into the Philosophy classroom, thankfully empty as it was only the beginning of break. Absently, he hopped up on a desk, resting one leg on top of the other as casually as he could.

   Harry, meanwhile, sauntered straight over to the teacher’s chair and arranged himself almost artfully inside it, feet propped up on the desk. ‘Yes.’

   Much as Louis would have liked to continue the conversation, he did have a question. ‘Won’t you get in trouble for that?’ Disrespect was soundly frowned on at his old school, and if a kid was caught messing around with anything belonging to the teacher, detention would follow like the crack of a whip.

   Harry just gave him another lazy, kitten-esque smile, propping his hands behind his head. ‘Maybe. Guess I’ll have to be punished, huh?’

   ‘Umm.’ Something about the way he said punished…‘Who is the teacher for this class?’

   He shut his eyes, tipping his head back as if he’d never been more content in his life. Now that Louis had the image of a cat in my head, he couldn’t get it out. ‘That’d be Mrs Flack.’

   ‘Harry? What are you – oh! Who are you?’

   Mrs Flack was in her early thirties. She had hair the colour of caramel aside from the various blonde highlights characteristic of a woman who longs for the ‘exotic’ air of a Spanish sunbather and is a cut above fake tan but a cut below sunbeds, and eyebrows plucked to within an inch of their lives. Not to mention a pretty impressive push-up bra.

   The sight of Louis seemed to have startled her quite severely and she was now just looking between him and Harry, gaping like a gutted fish.

   ‘This is Lou,’ Harry said eventually, an unfamiliar smirk cutting into his soft mouth. ‘He’s the new kid. I’ve been showing him the ropes.’

   ‘Oh, of course!’ Regaining her composure, the woman bared her teeth at Louis. ‘I wasn’t sure…well, it’s lovely to meet you. Lou?’

   ‘Louis,’ Louis corrected firmly. ‘Likewise, Mrs Flack.’

   After a couple more minutes of awkward, stilted silence, she asked Harry in clipped tones to please vacate her seat and he did so, flopping into the chair beside Louis’s commandeered desk and shooting him a look that dared him to deny him it.

   He almost did, just to see Harry’s face. But it wasn’t the worth of risk of sitting next to someone who…well, someone who wasn’t him.

   Louis had him pegged though. Petted. Self-entitled. Spoilt. The same as the rest of them.

   And yet somehow different.

 

*

‘Did you do anything today aside from think about Harry fucking Styles?’

   Louis threw a pen at Zayn’s head. ‘It was the first day, we weren’t supposed to learn anything.’

   ‘Louis William Tomlinson –’

   ‘It’s his fault for distracting me!’

   ‘Well the least you could do is stop distracting me when I’m trying to do my homework _which is based off of what you were supposed to learn today._ If all you’re going to do is talk about that boy you can leave the room.’

  Louis frowned. Zayn was not normally the type to take against people, especially not this hard and this fast. ‘What have you got against him?’

   ‘Niall’s been telling me about him and he sounds like nothing but trouble.’

   ‘How so?’

   He hesitated. ‘Look, you’ll probably find out sooner or later. I’m not the best person for passing stuff on.’

   He could bloody well say that again. With his quiet demeanour, dark clothes and downcast eyes, Zayn would have made an amazing eavesdropper had he not been so genuinely uninterested in the frivolities of everyday conversation. He genuinely just couldn’t bring himself to care. That he’d picked up on anything that Niall had said at all seemed miraculous – and definitely sufficient cause for suspicion. ‘You and Niall been getting on, then?’

   ‘Well enough,’ he replied coolly. ‘I hear you’re gay.’

   Wow. Harry worked fast. ‘Yeah, I said I wanted people to know.’

   ‘You’re brave, you know,’ he remarked, aligning his ruler carefully across his graph paper like a stock photo from a college for supermodels. ‘About the only thing you’ve got going for you.’

   ‘Rude,’ Louis retorted, before splaying himself out on Zayn’s battered corduroy couch alluringly, hands under my chin. ‘You’re the one who used to have a crush on me.’

   ‘We don’t talk about that anymore.’

   _‘You_ don’t.’

   ‘We don’t. Now.’ He picked up the pen and handed it back to Louis. ‘I expect total silence for the next fifteen minutes while I figure out this equation. In the meantime you are free to do whatever you wish. Perhaps it will involve some actual work. Small miracles and all that.’

   ‘Fuck you.’

   ‘Ssh.’

   Louis pouted. But, to his credit, he gave Zayn his fifteen minutes. He knew Louis’s cheat code: that, given specific instructions, he tended to do what he was told. It was those stupid sweeping generalisations like _‘Be good’_ and _‘Behave’_ that got him. The devil was in the detail, in that lack of detail brought out the devil in him.

   Louis didn’t work, though. He was too busy thinking about Harry. It was back when he still wrote terrible poetry and one line kept creeping into his head whenever he thought about him. He was sure it must belong to someone else because it was nothing he’d ever imagined before, but after racking his brain, searching his extensive collection of indie and pop-rock-punk lyrics, he decided that he must have made it up after all.

   He couldn’t resist muttering it out loud, just to see how it sounded. ‘To be underage and drunk off your eyes.’

   ‘Hmm?’

   ‘Nothing.’


	2. Give Him An Inch And He'll Suck You Off

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry and Niall explain the conspiracy behind school food. Harry is a bad genie. Nobody’s a slut, but Zayn is probably gay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> quick updates are probably going to be a thing on this one seeing as most of it's already written. enjoy!

The lunchroom of Louis’s new school was utterly bizarre. There were three separate vending machines full to the brim with sweets, chocolate and crisps. The entire room was yellow and orange. And it looked like just about nothing on the menu was Halal.

   When Louis mentioned this to Harry, he was rewarded with an extremely blank look. ‘Halal?’

   ‘Is no one in your school Muslim?’

   ‘Umm…I think there might be one guy in the year below.’

   ‘Seriously?’ About 75% of Louis’s last school was Islamic. Assemblies, food and holidays were all tailored to their beliefs. Louis didn’t even know what religion this school was – or rather, which branch of loose Christianity. ‘Well, Zayn needs to eat. And why is there so much sweet stuff?’ he added incredulously as they walked past a tray of cookies and brownies that looked like they were leaking grease. His last school forbade sweet or salty things, having been signed up to Jamie Oliver’s crusade of healthy eating. There was nothing in this room that didn’t look processed and most likely genetically modified.

   Harry stared at him. ‘We need sugar to stay awake, duh. You need to try these cookies by the way, they’re amazing. My treat.’

   Louis still couldn’t believe that they actually paid for lunch. And not even with straight up cash: these little credit card things with their passport photos on them. Not to mention how bloody expensive it was. Scholarships, needless to say, did not cover catering. His mum had put fifty quid on his card at the start of term and he wasn’t sure how he was going to tell her that it was barely going to last him three weeks.

   He let Harry buy him a cookie because he was curious, and bit into it before they even reached the table where Zayn and Niall already were. He could taste the grains of warm sugar on his tongue, and the chocolate instantly stuck to his teeth and coated his tongue like glue.

   It was the best thing he’d ever tasted in his life.

   Zayn gave it a look of distaste over his plain (hopefully anyway) cheese sandwich. ‘You’re not going to be able to sit still all afternoon.’

   ‘And you’re going to be starving.’

   ‘I’ll get you some crisps if you want, mate,’ Niall offered.

   Zayn shook his head. ‘Fuck knows what’s in them. There’s probably bloody goat in this cheese and all.’

   Harry snorted.

   Louis glared at him. ‘It’s not funny. Why is your food so weird?’

   Niall shrugged. ‘I guess they figure stuff us with as much energy as possible so we won’t drop dead before the end of the year. Except maybe from heart attacks.’

   Absentmindedly, Louis bit back into the cookie. And then again. God, it was good though. It tasted like sunshine and lust.

   Harry smirked. ‘You don’t have to eat it if you don’t like it, you know.’

   ‘Shut up,’ Louis mumbled through a mouthful of horrific goodness.

   Halfway through the lunch break, Harry excused himself to go for a swim (because this insane school had a swimming pool in the basement) and Zayn instantly turned to Niall. ‘Tell him what you told me about Harry.’

   ‘Hmm?’ Niall blinked for a minute, either too caught up in his food or just mesmerised by Louis’s friend’s face – either would have been understandable – and then his eyes lit up. ‘Oh yeah, that. Well, for patient-confidentiality reasons I’m not going to tell you everything he’s told me but I’ll tell you what everybody says about him and for a bonus I’ll tell you which parts of it are true. Aite?’

   ‘OK.’

   ‘First of all, he’s a womaniser. That’s not quite true. Second, he’s a tease. That’s very true. Third, he likes to walk around naked. That’s painfully true. Fourth – are you keeping up? Awesome – he’s a slut. That’s not true and if anyone ever said it around me I’d punch them in the teeth. Fifth, he’s slept with a couple of older men. That’s true. Sixth, he’s having an affair with the Philosophy teacher. That’s true. Seventh –’

   _‘What?_ Mrs Flack?’

   ‘Hey, voice down,’ he hissed. ‘Yes, Flack. As far as I can tell it’s been four months and they’re both very happy. Don’t broach the subject with him. If he wants to tell you about it, he will. Ditto everything else. Seventh, he’s in love with himself. To be honest, the jury’s out.’ His brow creased for a minute. ‘And, yep, that’s about it.’

 

*

So. Harry Styles was screwing the Philosophy teacher.

   Zayn texted Louis just as the last bell went. **_Sorry about that._**

**_You knew?_ **

**_Yeah. I thought it might have been a joke though. I guess I should have given you a heads-up._ **

**_That would have been nice. Are you coming home?_ **

**_Actually, Niall wants to show me a movie at his house. It’s called the Usual Suspects – have you heard of it?_ **

**_Zayn, everyone’s heard of that movie._ **

**_Oh. Well, Niall says it’s good._ **

Louis was two yards of tether away from typing back _Kevin Spacey is Keyser Soze._ But he didn’t quite have the heart so he just said **_Alright. Have fun._**

  Then soft curls brushed sweetly against his neck as Harry took a shameless peek over his shoulder. ‘Guess you’ve heard the news about Niall and Zayn ditching us.’

   ‘Us?’

   ‘Well, yeah.’ He stood up languorously, scraping his chair back, as the others rushed wildly out of the room. ‘If you want.’

   What exactly was he asking? Louis tried to search his face for clues, but none were forthcoming. He had the expression of a cherub in a Renaissance painting. Innocent. Young. Certainly not the face of someone who was having an affair with a 34-year-old married woman.

   After what felt like forever, Harry grinned. ‘I’m going to the park. Might get some coffee. Company is always appreciated.’ One of his eyelids flickered, almost like another wink. ‘Especially yours.’

   Two minutes later he was striding out of the school doors on his unfairly long legs, Louis trotting to keep up. He was in a waterproof jacket and the only skin Louis could see on him was the back of his neck and yet all he could think about was…well. Sex.

   Confession time: Louis was a virgin. Yep. Seventeen-year-old virgin. TV show waiting to happen, right? But he figured he’d watched enough amateur and professional porn to know what constituted sex. The kind of sex involving two or more dicks, anyway.

   Harry glanced back at him, eyes twinkling. ‘What are you thinking about?’

   It was stupid, but Louis was about 97% sure Harry knew exactly what he was thinking about. But maybe it was just what everybody thought about when they looked at him. Maybe he was more used to people verbalising it so now he just assumed. And maybe…maybe it was what he was thinking about too.

   Harry inclined his head. ‘Don’t lag behind. I want to see your face. It’s pretty.’

   Louis stopped as suddenly as if he’d walked into a brick wall.

   For a moment Harry frowned, almost losing his cool. Almost. ‘What’s up?’

   ‘You called me pretty.’

   ‘Yeah.’ He smiled. ‘You are. Nothing wrong with giving credit where it’s due.’

   Well, if he thought Louis was pretty…‘What do you think of Zayn?’

   ‘Your friend? He’s alright. I prefer blue eyes though.’ At last, he turned fully, folding his arms with an amused look. ‘So are we going to wait for the park to come to us?’

   Louis was not about to let this go. Purely for Zayn’s sake. ‘He’s way more gorgeous than me.’

   ‘I respectfully disagree,’ Harry retorted playfully. ‘He’s got the moody broody look down, I’ll give him that for free. But you have better bone structure.’

   This was news to Louis. ‘I do?’

   ‘Yeah. It’s more delicate.’ To Louis’s shock, Harry suddenly held out his hands and experimentally cupped his face. Louis nearly collapsed into them completely but, just about, he managed to hold himself upright while Harry’s grass-green eyes swept his features, a hidden laugh dancing around his mouth like a stripper with the rent due. ‘Kind of feminine.’

   Louis felt his skin start to burn. He had no idea if that was trying to be a backhanded compliment but that was how it came across, like a slap in his _feminine_ face. Was Harry taking the piss because Louis had told him he was gay? Or was he just this much of a dick to everybody?

   Louis kept his voice steady, steely. ‘Unhand me.’

   Harry shrugged. ‘Your wish is my command, fair one.’

   But he didn’t let go. They stood there staring at each other, Harry’s hands on Louis’s jaw, their hair bombarded by the wind, his sweet vanilla smell all over Louis’s senses like a rash.

   After a while, Louis cracked. ‘You’re a really awful genie.’

   Harry spluttered, but he did release him. Ice burnt sharply where their skin had met. Which meant absolutely nothing.

   And it didn’t mean anything when he took Louis to the park and they sat on the swings and talked about school and subjects and the stories behind the pictures on their lunch cards (Harry had been badly concealing a hangover and it showed; Louis had been delirious with a fever). And it definitely didn’t mean anything when they went for coffee and hung around outside the café with their scalding cardboard cups, one taking sips while the other made an inane comment about homework or the weather. It didn’t even mean anything when he insisted on walking Louis home and he got self-conscious because he lives in a block of flats on a council estate but Harry didn’t bat an eyelid even by the time it was looming above them in all its gravelly grey glory, he just kissed Louis on the cheek and said he’d see him tomorrow.

   And it didn’t mean anything. Nothing at all.

 

*

Louis made a mental note to tell Zayn that, despite his paranoia, they did not in fact need to be arriving at school forty minutes before first bell. Especially when he insisted on heading straight to their separate classrooms because _‘you could walk in a straight line from A to B with an hour to spare and still be late’._

   Unfortunately, Louis wasn’t late. In fact, he was bang on time to eavesdrop on a conversation a cluster of boys in his classroom were having about none other than Harry Styles (he was always exactly on point, just as the teacher called his name for registration. Fascinating).

   ‘Did you see him at the weekend? Looked like he was gasping for it.’

   ‘Please, he always is. Is there even anyone left to have a piece of him?’

   Louis ducked, in the unlikely event that they extracted their heads from their privileged arses and noticed that he was in the room.

   They did not. ‘You know what they say about Harry Styles. Give him an inch and he’ll suck you off.’

   Louis choked on air. None of them looked up.

   ‘He’s got a great mouth, though. I’m as straight as an arrow and I wouldn’t say no.’

   ‘Well, you’re in luck. Cos he sure as fuck never does.’

   They all laughed in their snooty, upper-middle-class snorts that made Louis want to punch them in the nose.

   Niall had said that Harry wasn’t a slut. But did that mean in the new-age ‘nobody’s a slut’ way? They both seemed like the type to enforce that. Which Louis was totally cool with. But he suddenly did have a very powerful urge to know exactly how many of these guys Harry Styles had slept with. For science.

   ‘Have you ever actually fucked him?’

   ‘Not yet. But I’ve seen it. He was on some dude’s lap in the club, and it was dark but I know that face. I’ve seen it on enough girls.’

   ‘Yeah, I know what you mean. I saw it on your mum last night.’

   Jesus. Was Louis really taking this seriously?

   Yes. Very.

   He didn’t want to listen to any more of this conversation. It was making him feel sick. But he couldn’t bury his head in his bag, or plug his headphones in, or even just put his hands over his ears. He needed to hear it. He needed to know.

   ‘God, I would wreck him. I bet he looks amazing fucked out. Just like a girl.’

   ‘Mate, better. There aren’t many guys who I’d pick over a bird but him…’

   ‘Same. I’m not even gay. There’s just something about him.’

   ‘Guess I’ll see you at the club on Saturday.’

   ‘You bet.’

   ‘Good luck with that. Stuck up little tease, that one is. He’ll get you hard and leave you hanging.’

   ‘Oh, I’m sure I could persuade him otherwise. He wants it really. Just wants you to be the one begging for it.’

   Now Louis didn’t need to know any more. He got out his iPod – but before he could even turn it on, curly hair and green eyes and just-fading dimples wandered into the room.

   The boys shut up. But they didn’t bother to smother their smirks. Stopper their stares. Their glinting eyes followed him all the way around the room until he took his seat next to Louis. With an overwhelming sense of effort, he smiled at him, perceptibly shutting them out. ‘Hey Lou.’

   ‘Hi,’ Louis said quietly. He didn’t want him to know what he’d heard, although he suspected that Harry had an idea. He told himself he didn’t care what Harry did on his own time; he was kind to him and that was all that mattered. Louis didn’t need anything more from him. ‘You alright?’

   ‘Yeah.’ He was pink, even for him. ‘Yeah, I’m fine. You?’

   ‘Yeah.’ Louis touched his hand briefly, gently, almost as if he could have imagined it. ‘I’m alright.’

 

*

Zayn’s face was screwed up in discomfort. ‘I’m not sure I should be hearing this.’

   ‘Well I have to tell someone. At least you weren’t there. It was gross; I felt like they were spreading him out on the table in front of me.’

   ‘Dude!’

   ‘Come on, I bet Niall talks about sex all the time.’

   He blushed. ‘That’s none of your business. Or mine.’ A twinkle caught his eye. ‘Sex should be kept between you and your hand.’

   ‘Hey!’

   It was OK, really. He was just as ‘pure’ as Louis, and just as annoyed about it. Still, Louis threw his Vaccines T-shirt at him unnecessarily hard. ‘Get dressed, gorgeous. Gay bars have standards, you know.’

   He groaned. ‘Do I have to go? You’re gonna be cosying up to fucking Styles all night; it’s not like you need me.’

   Louis winked. ‘I’m an exhibitionist. Besides, I’m gonna be your wingman.’

   ‘For the last time, I’m not –’

   ‘Oh come on Zayn, labels are _so_ twenty minutes ago.’ Louis took his hand, pulled him to his feet and pressed their lips sweetly together. Automatically, Zayn’s arms wound around his waist. They were both still shirtless from their showers, skin on skin unhindered – but they loved each other too much to take it further. They both drew back within seconds, and Louis licked his nose lightly. ‘I’ll love you forever?’

   Zayn sighed heavily, minty breath washing over Louis’s face like a toothpaste commercial. He was almost unnervingly beautiful up close, with his flawless skin and endless eyes. Where the fuck did Styles get off, thinking Louis was more attractive than him?

   ‘Alright,’ Zayn said eventually. ‘I’ll come.’

   Louis giggled.

   Zayn flicked him on the forehead. ‘Styles and I need to get you laid.’

   ‘At the same time?’

   ‘Oh my God!’ He pushed him gently away. ‘Just get dressed. They’re picking us up in fifteen minutes. Oh, and Niall said they’re bringing a friend. Apparently he works there.’

   Right on cue, Louis’s phone buzzed with the now all-too familiar name _Styles,_ a contact fast becoming more clicked than _Zayn-is-my-life._

   **_Hey Lou, heads-up there’ll be someone sharing the backseat with you guys. Feel free to take that any way you want ;) x_**

   Louis was still trying to decide whether he came across as a bigger shithead in person or over the phone. So far, it was too close to call. **_Bet you know way more about taking it than me._**

**_Wouldn’t you like to know? ;) x_ **

**_Stop winking at me._ **

**_How else are you gonna get the hint? ;) x_ **

   Rolling his eyes, Louis stuffed the phone back in his pocket. Zayn raised a quizzical eyebrow, but he just shook his head. Zayn shrugged and returned to texting Niall – which he’d been doing a lot lately, Louis had noticed. Up until a few weeks ago the only thing Zayn had used his phone for was Internet, and occasionally Snapchatting Louis if he was in a good mood. This was definitely an intriguing development.

   But before Louis could bug him about it, another message from _Styles_ came in. **_We’re outside. Bring that body, baby ;) x_**


	3. Grinding The Strobes Like Dust In The Sunlight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Liam exists and looks like ice cream. Harry likes skinny jeans, indie rock, and grinding. Louis is confused. And possibly an exhibitionist.

Harry leant back to smirk at Louis as he and Zayn clambered into the car – but for once, Louis wasn’t looking at him. Because the boy already folded up in the backseat, who Zayn ended up pressed right against with their legs practically tangled, was absolutely fucking glorious. He looked like David Beckham’s body double with a knife for a jawline and machine guns for arms.

   Instantly, Louis knew that he was the perfect person to prove Zayn’s hesitantly developing sexuality to him. Louis couldn’t have found someone better if he’d deliberately perused Forbes’ Top 100 Guys Who Look Like Ice Cream And Smell Like Money. He was undoubtedly the best. And Zayn most definitely deserved the best. Plus it was evident even in the darkened car that they complemented each other exquisitely, Liam’s muscular, burning beauty setting off Zayn’s slender, shining stunningness like a dream.

   So, naturally, Louis promptly leant over and stuck his hand between them. ‘Good to meet you, mate. I’m Louis. This is Zayn.’

   ‘Hi,’ his best friend muttered, and seemed oddly confused when Louis dug him in the ribs. He smiled at Niall instead, who was driving but looked back briefly to beam at them and introduce the massive slab of marble and caramel as Liam.

   Liam himself shook Louis’s hand dutifully with a small, whitened smile. ‘Hey there, Louis.’

   ‘How old are you?’ Zayn inquired, not sounding nearly as worshipful as Louis would have liked. Again, he elbowed him. Again, Zayn seemed oblivious as to why.

   ‘Twenty,’ Liam replied nonchalantly.

   ‘He works at the club,’ Harry informed them, his back bending as he craned over the carseat to join in their conversation. ‘He gives us booze; we give him rides.’ He bit his lip, giving Liam the sultriest look Louis had ever seen. ‘In the car, of course.’

   Out of the corner of his eye, Louis saw Liam squirm a little. He discarded it. Harry Styles could have made Louis Spence uncomfortable if he’d been so inclined. Liam definitely had the vibe. Within weeks, Louis promised himself, he’d be watching Liam kiss his best friend into subspace or his name wasn’t Louis Tomlinson, master of espionage and (as of right now) matchmaking.

   They pulled over at a petrol station and Niall dragged Liam out of the car to buy them cheap vodka and chasers to smuggle into the overpriced bar. Zayn went too, and Louis silently prayed to both their Gods that he’d taken his hint.

   Then all thoughts of Zayn completely left Louis’s mind because the next thing he knew, Harry was wriggling between the seats to get to him, splaying himself across the back of the car with his long, black denim-clad legs spilled over Louis’s lap as he shot him a cheeky, dimpled grin. ‘Hey there, Louis,’ he mocked, trying to imitate Liam’s smouldering gaze and looking absolutely ridiculous.

   The thing was, the breathy, unashamedly sexual tone of his voice went straight to Louis’s dick, along with the warmth of his body.

   He tried not to let it show. ‘Grow up, Styles.’

   ‘I can assure you, Lou, that I am fully _grown,’_ he retorted, his obnoxious, annoying self again. ‘Not quite ten inches, but I’ve never had any complaints.’

   ‘He’s ten _inches?’_ Louis spluttered, completely forgetting to mask his interested glance at Harry’s nether regions in his shock at this revelation about Liam. His ludicrously skinny jeans did not do much mask his length, and Louis couldn’t help staring.

   Almost infinitesimally, Harry bucked his hips. ‘Nine and a half, maybe. Me, I’m a solid seven.’ He winked, the physical embodiment of the stupid emoticon he wouldn’t stop sending. ‘Soft.’

   Louis felt his cheeks flare. He couldn’t resist. ‘And…hard?’

   Harry smirked. ‘I think you’d have to find that out for yourself.’

   He gave another slight thrust, and this time it looked far too much like an invitation. For a second, Louis imagined it: contorting himself into a triangle to get his mouth against Harry’s zip; pulling it down with his teeth and getting his lips around him; swallowing him down like a rent boy in a black cab; gulping down the evidence by the time the others came back so that all that remained would be the burn in his throat, and the satisfied, smug expression on Harry’s stupid gorgeous face…

   Whoa. Hell no. What kind of desperate kid did Harry think Louis was? ‘Don’t make me slap you, Styles.’

   His eyes glinted wickedly, green as glass. ‘What if I want to make you?’

   Louis was far enough out of his depth to be drowning, his arms fighting to flail as his brain gasped for air. Did Harry want him to slap him, or suck him off?

   What did _Louis_ want? He’d never gone farther than kissing, and even then they’d either been girls or Zayn. Harry, Harry had the experience of someone three times his age; had probably been given more fumbled blow jobs than he could count on both practiced hands.

   Given them, too.

   Unbidden, an image came into Louis’s head of Flack crying out, his curly head between her legs. He swallowed hard, suddenly feeling sick, and his voice sounded strange when he said ‘Get back in the front, Styles.’

   For a moment he thought that Harry would keep teasing. Maybe even push Louis’s head down for him. But then his expression seemed to soften and he scrambled back to his original seat obligingly, and they didn’t speak again until the others came back.

   Zayn glanced at Louis’s crimson face and inclined his head questioningly, but he just shrugged. He didn’t want Zayn distracted tonight. Liam was a catch, but something told Louis that he’d be a tricky one. He made a mental note to tell Zayn to ditch the bottle-top glasses before the night was out.

 

*

Louis was extremely drunk. We’re talking complete alcoholic saturation. Put a match to him and he’d have gone up in flames.

   He was already burning. The coloured lights were beating down on him like the glaring eyes of God and they fuelled him as he twisted and spiralled; a streak of boiling water translucent and invisible among awkward twinkish boys and half-naked men. They were all gorgeous in their own sweat-stained, breathless ways…but they weren’t what Louis wanted. His eyes half-shut as he ran his hands thoughtlessly, intimately over his own body, all he could picture was green and the deep dents of dimples.

   Then a sturdy, slim frame pressed against his; massive hands gripping his waist.

   Harry Styles’ voice was rough and ragged in his ear. ‘Do you have any idea what you look like?’

   Louis was too plastered to push him away. Even the memory of their near-tryst in the car, mortifying at the time, didn’t stop him from grinding back into Harry until he could feel him harden underneath him. ‘What do you think I look like?’

   Harry’s grip tightened, holding Louis flush against his legs. ‘Like you’re on a fucking stripper pole.’

   Louis’s words came out in a gasp. ‘And you were intrigued?’

   ‘Fuck you.’

   He sounded legitimately angry. Louis found himself wondering how long he’d been watching him grinding the strobes like dust in the sunlight; how this was the first time Harry had truly touched him. He found myself wondering if he would: strip him and take him right here on the dancefloor, a blotch of heat unnoticeable in this dark, roaring atmosphere.

   It wouldn’t even have to be as overt as that. Harry could push him up against a wall, wrap his legs around his hips and rut against him until they came like you do the first time you discover how to touch yourself – shellshocked at the sudden explosion of pleasure and the sticky mess inside their jeans. Louis would have let him. With Harry’s breath searing his soaking skin and his strong arms pinning him to his body, he would have done anything he said.

   But that didn’t stop Louis remembering what he’d heard that day in the classroom, and what he’d caught whispered snatches of ever since. The rumours about what Harry had done in this place before him; before this moment. ‘Styles?’

   ‘Yeah?’ he rasped. They were swaying half-heartedly, attempting to keep up the illusion of an innocuous dance even though Louis could feel him throbbing against his thigh.

   ‘Maybe you should give me a number so you remember which one I am in the morning.’

   Abruptly, Harry drew back. The sudden rush of cold air and the loss of his support nearly made Louis’s knees buckle. ‘What?’

   ‘A number,’ Louis repeated, too loudly. ‘Double, triple digits I don’t care, but I’d like to know you make some distinction between the people you fuck for kicks.’

   Harry stayed silent for a moment. Louis tried to turn but his hands stayed firmly on his waist, anchoring him.

   Then he spluttered. ‘Wow. You’re cooler than I thought. And just so you know, half of the boys who say they’ve fucked me are liars.’ Pause. ‘The other half have extremely realistic wet dreams.’

   ‘Oh.’

   ‘Yeah. I may not be a virgin, but I don’t sleep with snotty little schoolboys when I’m horny. Please, they wouldn’t have a clue.’

   ‘Oh.’ Louis wasn’t sure what else to say. Did this mean Harry didn’t want him?

   But as suddenly as he’d retreated, he pulled Louis close again, and this time in an entirely innocent way; almost an embrace. ‘You’re not like those twats, Lou. S’why I like you. Now I hate to say this, but we should get out of here. My curfew expires at twelve, but you guys are welcome to come stay at my house.’ He nuzzled Louis’s neck tantalisingly. ‘I have toffee popcorn and an extensive collection of indie rock CDs.’ Pause. ‘Dude, are you _hard?’_

   ‘Look who’s talking,’ Louis hissed, pressing his arse once more against Harry’s crotch. No way was he letting Harry humiliate him. It was the boy, not his ‘extensive collection of indie rock CDs’, that had pushed all the blood in Louis’s body decidedly south. Not that there really could have been anything more embarrassing than that.

   ‘True,’ Harry admitted. He let his hand brush briefly; excruciatingly, against the bulge in Louis’s jeans. ‘Might have to do something about that when we get home.’

   ‘Well then,’ Louis mumbled, his eyelids drooping as a head-rush swept him away in Harry’s arms. ‘Take me home.’

 

*

When Louis woke up, he was completely enveloped in Harry goddamn-his-arms-were-strong Styles.

   Louis lay very still, partly because it felt surprisingly nice, and partly because he was trying to remember exactly what had happened last night through the aching haze in his head.

   They hadn’t had sex. He could gauge that much from the fact that he was still fully-clothed and half hard – as, indeed, was Harry. But he remembered – _oh Jesus –_ he remembered after Liam, Niall and Zayn had already dropped off on the floor Harry had pulled him into his bedroom (four-poster bed; walk-in wardrobe; flatscreen: the works), opened a drawer full of what-we’ll-just-call toys and asked him if he wanted one. To which Louis might have freaked out a little and not calmed down until he’d coaxed him into his bed and cuddled him sweetly for ages, apologising and saying they’d take it slow, take it so so slow…

   So slow, it seemed, that they hadn’t even got around to actually doing anything.

   That _drawer_ though, Louis was still having trouble convincing himself it was actually real. He had so much _stuff,_ so obviously for insertion and then there were the things Louis hadn’t even been able to identify, although he’d vaguely recognised an extremely intimidating set of clamps and what he could have sworn was a collar, with small spikes set around the outside. What kind of seventeen year old had all that at their disposal? Who could it have been for?

   It couldn’t be Flack. Louis pushed that thought from his mind. Was Harry some kind of camboy? But surely Niall would have warned him?

   Ugh. He needed to snap out of this; he was behaving like some conservative catholic soccer mom from the sixties. Why did he care so much if Harry used toys? Louis probably would have too if he’d been able to afford them or knew where to go.

   Maybe it wasn’t that that had made him so panicked. Maybe it was that Harry had been so ready to lend one to him; possibly to watch while Louis fucked himself open and shivered and moaned around the length; to stroke himself off as Louis shuddered through his climax with the coloured cock still inside. That that would have been an acceptable alternative to just having sex with Louis himself. Louis knew it wasn’t up to him to judge anyone’s kinks – but to him, that just seemed odd. He’d been right in front of Harry practically begging for it and he’d wanted to watch him get himself off with a piece of plastic?

   What did that make Louis?

   The boy beside him stirred slightly, his knees slotting against Louis’s. Louis kept his breathing carefully even, not wanting to wake him before he was ready. He was so much more likeable when he was asleep. Soft and pliant and suggestible. Like this, Louis could actually put up with him. Plus he definitely seemed like the type who’d be grumpy in the morning.

   But that didn’t stop Louis physically tearing himself from his hold when Niall stuck his head around the door with his trademark beam. ‘Morning boys! Toast?’

   Harry sat up like a shot. ‘Not on the carpet, Niall!’

   ‘Relax, weirdo, it’s on a plate. No crumbs, I got it.’

   ‘Kitchen. Now.’

   He rolled his eyes. ‘On my way. Just get here quick. You know what Liam’s like. And me for that matter.’ Boldly, he stuffed the slice in his hand into his mouth. ‘Also your blender might be broken,’ he added quickly through the mouthful before ducking out.

   ‘For crying out loud…’ Harry ran his fingers through his curls in a way that really shouldn’t have been so sexy, before pulling Louis’s shirt off without preamble, spraying him with a bottle of _Dove_ deodorant and slotting his arms into a hoodie before he even knew what was happening. ‘There. Slightly more presentable.’

   And there was why Louis hadn’t wanted him to wake up. ‘Condescending tw–’

   ‘No bad language,’ Harry interrupted. ‘My head hurts. Come on. If you’re very good I’ll make chocolate-chip pancakes.’ He kissed Louis’s forehead. ‘And you can have as many as you want.’

   Then he was gone.

   ‘Twat,’ Louis muttered, but the victory was hollow. His hoodie was butter-soft, and smelled like apples.

   Before Louis left the room, he took another quick peep in the drawer.

   Yep. It was real.

   Apparently Louis was in deep shit.

   But the morning was amiable enough. Louis kept a close eye on Zayn and Liam, noting how their hands brushed as they both reached for the orange juice at the same time. He barely noticed when Harry wound his ankle around his underneath the table – but he did notice when his hand crept onto Louis’s knee and then climbed lazily up until his fingers were resting on his thigh. And he could hardly pretend not to notice when he started feeding him pancakes one-handed, accidentally-on-purpose smearing syrup on his dry lips. The other three couldn’t ignore it either, and they all glanced at each other before giving them strange looks. Louis felt himself blush…but he didn’t want to stop him. There was something enjoyable about being petted like this – and something exciting about knowing that they were watching. This was how the best porn videos started, and it wasn’t like that was what Louis wanted – Harry and even Liam at a stretch would be hot but not Niall and absolutely not Zayn – but it felt so good to feel their eyes on him while he absently licked chocolate from his fingers, and when his other hand started purposefully stroking Louis’s leg it only turned him on more, so he was practically a wreck by the time Zayn cleared his throat awkwardly and suggested they leave.

   Liam nodded hastily. ‘Niall, mate, why don’t we go to the movies?’

   Niall nodded happily. ‘Sounds fantastic. Zayn, you in?’

   Helplessly, Zayn looked at Louis. Louis could see how much he wanted to go – and God knows he wanted Zayn to go, and maybe even steal a kiss in a darkened movie theatre – but he could also see that he wanted Louis’s support, always twitchy around new people and groups larger than two.

   But Harry had already decided for him. ‘You boys have fun. Me and Lou are gonna hang out here.’

   ‘I can’t go,’ Zayn blurted out, flushing darker than Louis had ever seen him. ‘I…I don’t have any cash on me.’

   Harry and Liam’s hands automatically went to their pockets – but Niall got there first, slinging an arm around his shoulders. ‘Don’t be an arse, mate, I owe you big-time for helping me out with that essay. A ticket and we’ll call it even.’

   ‘But –’

   ‘Come on, it’s seven quid. An A from Vernon is priceless. Harry, back me up.’

   ‘For that, I think you’re gonna have to do better than a ticket, Niall,’ Harry deadpanned. ‘At least buy the boy some lunch as well.’

   ‘Well obviously that goes without saying,’ he grinned.

   They were out the door before Zayn could protest further, but Louis did catch the hint of a reluctant smile jabbing at the corner of his sweet mouth.

   ‘So,’ Harry purred, resting his right hand on Louis’s stomach. ‘We’re alone.’

   ‘Yeah,’ Louis murmured, licking the last of the syrup from his lips, uncertain in their sudden solitude. ‘I guess we are.’

 

*

Anticlimactically enough, they ended up just hanging out, on their stomachs in Harry’s decadent sitting room complete with chandelier. He still touched Louis, fingering patterns on his back over his sweater and occasionally playing with his hair, but some of the charge seemed to have gone out of their proximity, and in some ways Louis was grateful for it. Without it, Harry seemed more friendly, and less like he was in on some private joke with himself.

   Louis was careful. He didn’t mention the toys, or Miss Flack, or the ‘older men’ Niall had mentioned. He let Harry direct the conversation, and the first thing he did was ask Louis what he thought of Liam. ‘He’s hot, isn’t he?’

   ‘Yeah. Not really my type though.’

   ‘Uh huh. You were staring at him all night.’

   ‘I was scouting him out, moron. I’m trying to get Zayn to come out of his shell. Pun intended. He seems like one of the very few people in the world who’d be good enough for him.’

   ‘That’s sweet.’ He didn’t sound like he thought it was sweet. ‘Well apologies, but I’m afraid he’s taken. Or he will be. I’m working on setting him up with Niall.’

   _‘What?’_

   ‘What?’ he said defensively. ‘Believe it or not, I actually have a similar problem with him. He doesn’t think he likes guys. I need to prove him wrong.’

   ‘And you seriously think Liam would go for him over _Zayn?’_

   ‘I don’t understand what’s so great about Zayn, God. I guess if you go for the whole novelty ethnic thing –’

   ‘Stop right fucking there.’ Louis sat up, leaning away from him, anger swelling in his chest. ‘Believe it or not, most of the people at my last school were Muslim. There’s no _novelty ethnic_ thing about my life; the other side of the tracks is the most diverse place you’ll ever be. Not that you’d know anything about that. Zayn is fucking gorgeous in any context of colour, and if all you can see about him is his skin then you need a punch in the nose. And a better education.’ His voice was raising now, and getting higher. ‘Do you have any idea how much of a privileged, white arsehole you sound –’

   ‘Hey, hey.’ Harry held up his hands, before reaching out for Louis’s ankles and giving them a gentle tug so he was on his back on the floor gazing up at the light spilling from the chandelier, the perfect symbol of Harry’s lucky little life. Then he was hovering above him, their faces parallel, blocking everything else out. ‘I’m sorry. That sounded really racist, and I apologise. But Niall and Liam mean a lot to me. They’ve been my project for six months. And while Zayn is admittedly dazzling – although not nearly as dazzling as you – it’s not happening.’

   Louis glared at him. ‘Yes it is.’

   Harry’s eyes glittered back at him like sun-kissed stagnant lakes. ‘Wanna bet?’

   ‘I don’t have any money,’ Louis snapped back. Normally pointing out the difference in their social statuses would have been something to be avoided at all costs, but right now he just wanted to make Harry think twice and check his privilege the next time he was about to say something like _the novelty ethnic thing._

   Predictably, but irritatingly, he seemed completely unruffled. ‘Do you really think you have nothing else to offer me, Louis Tomlinson?’

   And there was the charge again, buzzing and undeniable, like a static lightning bolt between them. All of a sudden, Louis was hyper aware that Harry was on top of him, and he sensed his legs twitch as if to spread, and give him complete access to anything Harry wanted from him. Strange how, even though he had no experience, he somehow knew instinctively exactly what to do.

   Then Harry’s phone buzzed in the front pocket of his jeans, dangerously close to Louis’s crotch.

   He eased it out, glanced at the screen – and immediately rolled off. ‘Shit, I forgot. I promised Nick I’d be on his radio show.’ He smiled smugly, eyes fixed on the screen, seemingly having forgotten all about Louis. ‘He says ratings triple every time I’m on.’

   Tentatively, unsure if he’d even hear him, Louis ventured ‘Radio show?’

   ‘Mmm.’ He didn’t shift his focus, now tapping out a reply complete with a tongue-out selfie. ‘It’s technically illegal – we’re hijacking a dead channel but still – but we’ve got a really loyal audience.’

   ‘We?’

   ‘Mmm hmm. Me and Grimmy.’ Another selfie, his face freezing into an unfairly stunning smile before relaxing back into the contented expression of a sleepy kitten. ‘So I’ve got to go. Sorry. You’re welcome to hang around here for a few hours…’

   Louis didn’t hear the rest of his sentence. Harry had made him abandon Zayn, worked him up into a near frenzy and now he was running off to co-host a radio show? What even _was_ this boy? No Louis wasn’t going to hang around his house like a fucking dog, waiting for him to get back. He was already standing, his legs shaky but holding firm. ‘I have homework. Have fun on the show.’

   ‘Thanks.’ Harry didn’t even bother to get up, still glued to his phone. ‘You can get home alright, yeah?’

   ‘Mmm.’ It would take a long time, but Louis needed a good walk. Maybe he’d even be able to sort out what the fuck had happened between them in the last twenty four hours. ‘Bye.’

   ‘Bye.’ Harry still didn’t look up.

   Louis slammed the front door, but since the sitting room he was in was two flights up, he doubted Harry had even heard.


	4. He's The Sort To Get Under Your Fingernails

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry sends nudes to wrong numbers. Zayn is mysterious, and Niall takes loving food to new levels. Louis is the only one who finds it weird that Harry is hooking up with the Philosophy teacher. There’s alcohol and scoop necks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm not sure if this is a thing that happens in America, so an EPQ is an Extended Project Qualification and it's just a project you do (most often a long essay) that gets counted as an extra A Level

‘LOUIS!’

   ‘STAN!’ Louis yelled back, feeling a smile split his face like a hammer. Just hearing Stan’s voice (his friend hadn’t clicked his video icon yet: he always forgot) was enough to make honey pour sweetly and stickily over all the screws of panic now constantly whirring in Louis’s chest. He never really did get over him.

   At last his face flashed up, rounded and grinning and all eyes, just as Louis remembered it. ‘What’s up, dude?’

   Louis burst out laughing. ‘Please tell me that’s not how you talk, now.’ He could imitate Honey Boo Boo with the best of them, but the accent he was putting on now sounded more Australian than American. Besides, Louis had always loved his dry British burr. He didn’t think he could handle losing it now.

   For a moment, Stan pouted. Then he grinned again. ‘Of course not mate, I’m not that much of a douchebag.’

   ‘Thank fuck. So how is the land of the free?’

   ‘Oh my God, Tommo, the gay scene is so a _ma_ zing. Kind of risky, but there are so _many_ of us, and there’s even a Gay-Straight Alliance; how cool is that? Plus the weather is _beautiful._ You’d love it Tommo, really.’

   Louis didn’t doubt it.

   He definitely didn’t doubt that anywhere would be better than here.

   It had been nearly a month since his impromptu ‘sleepover’ with Styles, and since then they’d seen each other every day and most nights, for the most part with Zayn, Niall and occasionally Liam, but even more occasionally just the two of them. They’d invariably go to Harry’s house after picking up coffee or chips and go to his bedroom for a movie and a chat. Once or twice he’d offered Louis a look around the drawer that he was becoming steadily more curious about as the weeks wore on. Louis would decline but with increasing reluctance – and that would be the only time that they’d explicitly talk about sex. Harry still touched him in the easy, familiar way he did but they never got anything like as close as they’d been at the club that night. They’d go there with the others, but Harry didn’t dance with him.

   On an unrelated note, Louis had only jacked off to the thought of him about eight times. In the last week.

   Don’t judge. He couldn’t help it: he didn’t set out to picture him but it was always his face on the drummers and guitarists that dominated his fantasies; his voice Louis heard when they opened their pretty, oversized mouths. Harry had taken him over, as surely as his company was starting to take up the entirety of his time. And he simply couldn’t bring himself to do anything about it. Despite himself, he liked him. He was obnoxious and depraved and spoilt, but he liked him.

   For obvious reasons, none of these facts presented themselves as appropriate responses to Stan’s next words, which were to ask how Louis was doing.

   So Louis just shrugged. ‘Can’t complain.’

   ‘Come on Tommo, spill! How’s private school? _Fabulous?’_ he guessed, through his nose.

   ‘But of _course,’_ Louis drawled back, doing his best imitation of Tom Parker. ‘I’ve already acquired a private yacht by osmosis. And I’ve found a sugar daddy.’

   Stan spluttered. _‘Gracious!_ Do tell.’

   Obligingly, Louis began to describe Liam for him, focusing particularly on the so-far-unconfirmed ten inches he supposedly possessed beneath his boxers, but sparing a few sprawling metaphors for his muscles and his facial hair. Stan looked utterly entranced by the time he ran out of steam. And completely unconvinced. ‘I can’t see them, but I’d say your pants, as the Americans would say, are on fire my dear Mr. Tomlinson.’

   Louis relented. ‘Alright, we’re not dating. But he does exist, swear to God. I’m trying to set him up with Zayn.’

   ‘You don’t say. Huh. Well then, who _have_ you got your eye on?’ He winked. ‘Promise I won’t get jealous.’

   If only.

   Louis didn’t want to give him a description of Harry Styles. He didn’t want to tell him how the day Harry had abandoned him for his radio show, he’d listened to it, having texted Niall to ask what channel it was on. How weird it had been to hear his voice, sounding even throatier than usual, alongside that of an incredibly camp, unashamedly Northern thirty-year-old as they discussed Lady GaGa and McBusted like teenage girls in a bedroom papered with boybands. How Louis had managed to make himself come to the sound of Harry laughing at some cheap quip made by his irritating co-host – who, incidentally, had introduced himself as Nick Grimshaw – and washed his hands while they were still shaking, trying to tell himself, yet again, that it hadn’t meant anything.

   He certainly didn’t want to tell him that yesterday, just as he was drifting off to sleep while playing Candy Crush, a Snapchat came swooping in from Harry which he clicked on expecting one of his usual inane selfies coupled with a caption like _Homework…_ or _I’m boooored…_ or sometimes even just _Hiii ;)._ That instead, he’d found himself staring straight at a picture of his fully erect, leaking dick, the words blazoned across it spelling out _Gonna let me touch? :(_

   That he texted Louis two minutes later, just three words that only served to make him even more confused. _Sorry. Wrong number x_

   That it didn’t stop Louis getting off to him yet again, for the second time that day, even though the photo was long gone; evaporated into cyberspace. Like he said, he couldn’t help it. Harry had him.

   And Louis was pretty damn sure that he knew it.

   ‘No one,’ he replied eventually. ‘Not really. No.’

 

*

There was precisely one thing that Zayn, Niall, Styles and Louis all had in common. And that was that they were all doing EPQs.

   To be fair, they weren’t in a minority. About a quarter of the year had showed up to this pre-beginning pep talk, and collected the folders they would need on this ‘exciting new journey’, as their perky guidance counsellor Mrs Cole persisted in calling it.

   The folder happened to come with a list of the people doing them and the title they’d chosen, and Louis scanned it idly while Harry poked at his side trying to make him giggle and Zayn and Niall bent their heads over what Louis recognised as the former’s sketchbook.

   He was an amazing artist, Zayn. When they were younger he’d even designed him and Louis their own comic book, starring Malik Man and his equally-important henchman Louis the Brave. Louis still had it tucked in with his socks to look at whenever he felt exhausted or weak or sad. Zayn had given him super-strength, laser-vision and wings, affording himself only the token ability to stop time, which he used only when the situation absolutely demanded it – which, the comic never failed to point out, around Louis the Brave rarely did. Louis had never known he needed it, but now he didn’t know what he’d do without it to remind him that someone believed, unconditionally, in his worth.

   One by one, he found their names on the list.

   **Niall Horan – Is Feedism A Legitimate Branch Of BDSM?**

   Louis blinked. Read it again. Blinked again. OK. He’d have to talk to him about that later.

**Zayn Malik – Untitled**

   Typical. He even had to be an enigma on paper. How had he even managed to get away with that?

**Harry Styles – Why Is There A Negative Stigma Around Single Mothers And What Can We Do To Erase It?**

   Huh. Not what Louis would have expected from him. At all.

**Louis Tomlinson – Does The Way Queer People Are Portrayed In Mainstream Media Negatively Affect The Public Perception And Individual Self Esteem Of Queer Individuals?**

   Yeah, yeah, the gay boy chose a gay topic. He’d just figured it would be easy for him to rant for five thousand words about the Big Bang Theory and the clusterfuck of opportunities the writers had missed to explore the characters’ obvious queer inclinations. He’d just have to find some way to relate it to Judith Butler.

   Why was he even bothering to think about his title when Niall had literally just outed himself as into one of the shadiest sexual practises on the spectrum? ‘Oi, Horan.’

   He looked up, blue eyes wide and deceptively innocent. ‘Yeah?’

   Louis jabbed at his place on the page. ‘Explain?’

   ‘It’s not a sexual thing,’ he clarified hastily. ‘Well, I mean it is but I’m not necessarily, y’know, into it. I just think it’s interesting.’ He grinned cheekily. ‘I do love curves, though.’

   Zayn frowned, glancing briefly down at his stomach before returning to his sketchbook armed with a charcoal pencil. Louis suddenly felt bad about bringing up anything to do with food around him. He knew how sensitive Zayn had always been about his weight, slipping briefly over the edge of anorexia when the boys were sixteen and only recently brought back from the brink by an intense course of therapy on behalf of the NHS (kind of like the one Louis is having now). They hadn’t talked about it as such but Louis knew, and he was normally more careful about it. His tapped his foot gently against Zayn’s, and the other boy looked up momentarily to smile at me. Louis relaxed a little, confident enough now to turn to Harry. ‘How come you chose single mothers?’

   He shrugged. ‘I’m not all sex, Lou.’ He flashed his teeth, but his dimples didn’t emerge like they normally did. ‘I can see why you made that mistake, though. My Mum raised me on her own and she’s always had to put up with so much shit for it, especially cos we have different surnames. I can protect her from it now, sort of, but I can’t ever make up for that. So this is my sad attempt at trying.’

   Louis felt his eyebrows twitch in shock. That was…actually kind of deep. Maybe he’d misjudged Harry Styles.

   Harry smirked. ‘Though right now I’d rather write one about why your arse is so gorgeous.’

   Maybe not. ‘Fuck off.’

   He licked his lips exaggeratedly lecherously, eyeing the back of Louis’s trousers like his next meal. ‘Should be fucking illegal, Lou, seriously.’

   ‘Hazza, leave him alone,’ Niall interjected as Louis squirmed (Harry could be so fucking aggressive sometimes, and it turned him on but it also scared him a little, like he was worried Harry was going to give it up and force himself on Louis in the middle of a classroom or the assembly hall).

   At a nudge from Zayn, Niall’s eyes lit. ‘Oh, and we wanted to talk to you guys about something…Haz, you know how the drama department are pushing us to do a play?’

   Louis’s ears pricked up. As an aspiring actor, he was always on the lookout for Drama opportunities. He’d been Danny in _Grease_ back at my old school and, if he said so himself, he’d absolutely smashed it.

   Harry rolled his eyes, still noticeably a bit worked up, although whether from Louis’s arse or his question, he wasn’t sure. ‘I’m aware.’

   ‘Well Zayn’s written one,’ Niall announced proudly, clapping Louis’s friend on the back. ‘And he says we’re welcome to it. It’s based around Shakespeare’s sonnets.’

   Louis frowned, taken aback once more. Zayn wrote a play? And he showed it to Niall? He was notoriously cagey about his work, whether English or Art. He’d worked on the comic alone for nearly six months before plucking up the courage to show it to Louis, his best friend. He’d barely known Niall for two.

   ‘You don’t have to,’ Zayn muttered, still buried in his book. ‘It was just a project, it’s shit…’

   ‘It’s brilliant!’ Niall declared. ‘Plus it will finally get the other techies off our backs. Haz, Louis, you in?’

   Louis nodded like a shot.

   ‘Sure.’ Harry smiled at Zayn. ‘Sounds good.’

   Louis had noticed he was being far nicer to Zayn since his little _novelty ethnic_ slip. Probably desperately trying to convince himself that he wasn’t racist.

   On the way out of the room, he gave Louis a light slap on the arse.

   Louis turned around and punched him in the nose.

   Or he should have. Instead, he went fiery red and made a run for it.

 

*

Harry didn’t join the other boys for lunch, as he said he had ‘an appointment with Mrs Flack’.

   ‘Is that what I think it is?’ Louis asked Niall as Styles sauntered away, leaving them in the queue outside the lunchroom.

   They’d had numerous classes with Flack since Niall’s revelation about her relationship with Harry, and it was odd for Louis to observe, knowing what he knew. Every look she gave him when he inevitably started to mess about with his pens or his homework diary; every time she chose him to answer a question; every smart-aleck comeback he came up with had extra connotations, invisible to the naked eye but all too obvious under a telescope. Louis tried not to notice. He never quite managed it.

   ‘Mmm hmm. Listen, we need to talk.’

   Louis frowned, unsure what Niall would have to say to him that he wouldn’t say in front of Harry. ‘OK.’

   The blond boy leant back against the computer-carrying desks lining the hall, crossing one skinny leg over the other. Immersed in his iPod and his History textbook, Zayn followed suit as if by design.

   Niall cleared his throat, a little uncomfortably. ‘It’s about Harry.’

   ‘Oh.’ Louis waited. Niall was fiddling with his fingers, no explanation seeming to be forthcoming. ‘And?’

   ‘He’s my best friend,’ he blurted out. ‘And he’s a good person and he means well but…honestly, he’s bad news, mate. It’s not your fault he’s flirting with you but –’

   ‘Is he? I hadn’t noticed.’

   ‘Come on, mate. He’s not subtle about it when he wants something. Sorry about that by the way; he’s not great about personal space either. Anyway, the point is it’d be better for you if you ignore it. He’ll give up eventually. No offence to your arse, but he’s not the type to fixate on something if it doesn’t reciprocate.’

   But what if Louis didn’t want him to give up? ‘Why the interest?’

   Niall shrugged awkwardly. ‘I don’t know. You seem like a nice guy. I’d really rather he didn’t leave you in pieces.’

   Louis bristled. ‘What the hell makes you think he’s gonna leave me in pieces?’

   Zayn must have been paying more attention than he’d let on, because that was when he raised his head, looked straight at him, and let one of his eyebrows twitch. It was a look that said _Mate, I had to listen to you cry over Stan for nearly three months. Forget breaking you, you’re lucky if he’ll even manage to put you back together first._

   Louis gave him a death glare in return. Unruffled, he returned to his book.

   Why did he have to be so bloody right all the time?

   Niall bit his lip. ‘It’s…kinda what he does to people. People younger than thirty anyway.’

   Louis’s stomach twisted, the image of his mouth buried in Flack’s thighs flashing in front of his eyes again like an omen. He tried to keep his voice calm. ‘What, does he do this a lot? The flirting?’

   ‘Not a lot,’ Niall conceded. ‘Most of the time he doesn’t bother. But he tried it with me, when we first met. Almost fell for it too. Then I found out about Flack and told him to fuck off.’ He grinned. ‘And now he’s my best mate. Problem solved. But it’s probably better for everybody if you don’t have to go through that.’

   Louis stared at him. Harry had tried it on with him?

   Of course he had. Louis wondered dully how far he’d gone; whether they’d ever actually got around to testing out some of his toys…

   ‘Louis? You alright?’

   For some reason, Louis’s eyes were stinging. He was glad of the pain: he wanted to slap himself for being so ridiculous. He hadn’t seriously thought that he was special…right? Obviously Harry fucking Styles hadn’t just looked at him and fallen in love with his bone structure and made him his exception.

   And Louis didn’t care. Why would he? He thought that Harry was an arrogant arse, in the immortal words of Bridget Jones. He didn’t even have a crush on him. Yeah he was the fittest boy in their year but it wasn’t like that was hard. Sexual stimulation is not the same thing as romantic attachment – and in Harry’s case Louis figured they had to be mutually exclusive. He couldn’t help thinking that if he was romantically attached to him he would feel far too protective to even think about touching himself to his inadvertent nudes. And that wouldn’t have been fun at all. No, Louis had the right state of mind about Styles, he was sure of it. To his relief, his next statement came out with complete confidence. ‘Don’t worry about it, Niall. I don’t tend to fall for guys who treat me like Playgirl pin-ups.’

   ‘Aite.’ Serious stuff over, he reverted to his normal cheery self, giving Louis a friendly punch on the shoulder. ‘Just thought I should warn you. In case you didn’t notice, he’s the sort to get under your fingernails. And you look like you care about cleanliness a lot more than me.’

   When Louis walked into Philosophy class later and Harry was already there, Flack pink-faced as she wrote today’s topic on the board with trembling hands, he gave him a dirty look. When Harry pulled him onto his lap as he tried to walk past his chair to get to his own, he squirmed. When he felt him twitch beneath his trousers, he wriggled, figuring Harry would have to let him up if he didn’t want to embarrass himself. But the harder he grew, the tighter he held on and when he finally let Louis up, quickly adjusting himself so he didn’t show, Louis could still feel the imprint of how he’d pressed into him, and his face didn’t stop burning until the bell rang and he bolted outside, the cold air the punch in the face he needed to remind himself that Styles was bad news – and, more important, he meant nothing. Definitely not. No way.

 

*

That Friday, the boys went out to the club and then back to Harry’s house, as usual. Since that first time, Louis hadn’t slept in Harry’s bed once, all five of them curling up like kittens on the various sofas and beanbags in his sitting room.

   But that day, Louis woke up in the middle of the night and stumbled to the bathroom half-asleep to piss – and his curly-haired counterpart followed. ‘Whatcha doing?’

   ‘Whaddaya think?’ Louis slurred, drunk on sleep (and three vodka-and-Cokes, but never mind those; he wasn’t a lightweight or anything).

   He managed to make it to the bathroom without tripping up, a miracle in itself, but when he turned around and tried to shut the door, Harry pushed it open again, making sure he was inside too before he closed and bolted it as if they’d planned this, like a married couple sneaking into the tiny bathroom on a plane to get the kick back in their love life.

   Louis’s heart had started to creep up his throat, and at the quiet click it leapt right into his mouth. ‘Harry?’

   ‘Ssh,’ he murmured distractedly, turning to face Louis with his eyelids drooping. He reached out for him, grasping at the hem of his T-shirt, his hands hot and big enough to span Louis’s entire torso if they’d wanted to. ‘Wanna play pretend?’

   ‘What d’you mean?’ Louis sounded slow and stupid, his words oozing like tarred treacle. Harry’s face was swimming in and out of focus, but Louis could see that his eyes were intent on his lips. ‘H-Harry?’

   ‘What’s your fantasy, Lou?’ he drawled, starting to pull at the fabric wrapped around his fingers. Louis tried desperately to keep himself from falling, knowing that if he did it would be to his knees. He felt his scoop collar slip as his T-shirt stretched, and Harry’s eyes moved down to burn into the freshly exposed skin. ‘Getting fucked on a tiled floor?’

   Louis gasped at the bluntness of the request. He cringed at how much he wanted to say yes.

   But he couldn’t. Louis had _principles,_ Goddamnit. Plus he still needed to piss. ‘F-fuck off, Styles.’

   ‘You’re stuttering,’ Harry observed, with a sharp smile. He pulled harder, his other hand coming up to cup Louis’s cheek, cool against his crimson skin. ‘I think you want it, Lou. I do, you know. Can’t…stop thinking about you. Try. Try to go one night without dreaming about those eyes…that mouth…’ His thumb moved to Louis’s lower lip, tugging it down. Louis’s mouth fell open easily and Harry shoved two fingers inside as if it was an invitation. Instinctively, he gagged, but when Harry didn’t take them out, just kept staring at his mouth, he started, experimentally, to suck. They tasted like soap and sweat.

   Harry shuddered, his green eyes glazing over. ‘Ah, fuck Lou, why do you do this to me?’ His voice came out pitchy, almost a whine.

   It was enough. Louis came to his senses. What in the ever-loving fuck was he doing? Had he not listened to a word Niall had said? He bet Niall hadn’t let Harry go even this far. Did Louis have no self-restraint at all?

   He pulled away, letting Harry’s fingers slip spit-slick from his mouth with a _pop._ They left their taste in his mouth, salty and strong. ‘Go back to bed, Styles.’

   He glanced up at Louis with hooded eyes, his breathing heavy. ‘What did you say?’

   ‘I said go.’ Louis tossed his hair out of his eyes, feigning confidence. ‘I’m not letting you fuck me. Not tonight. Not ever.’

   Harry’s jaw actually dropped. He looked like an utter idiot. ‘Seriously?’

   ‘Yes Styles, _seriously,’_ Louis hissed. He’d humiliated him; it was time to return the favour. He yanked Harry’s hand away from his T-shirt, and for good measure he shoved him in the chest. ‘Now kindly fuck off so I can piss in peace. Got it?’

   He didn’t move. His jaw was still slack. He looked…almost hurt.

   There was too much of Louis that wanted to hug him. Far too much of him that wanted more. ‘I said fuck off.’

   Harry shook his head hard, as if to chase away the upset expression on his face. It seemed to work as well, because when he next focused on Louis he was back to his irritating, self-satisfied, dimple-dented self. ‘We’re gonna play it like that, are we?’

   ‘I am _not_ playing –’

   ‘Want to come with me to the radio show tomorrow?’

   ‘Huh?’

   He shrugged, private jokes playing in his eyes. ‘I think Nick would like you. Not as much as he likes me – that’d make me cross – but enough. What do you say?’

   Louis eyed him suspiciously. He didn’t want to say yes…but he did kind of want to go, if only to meet the man who made Harry’s voice go all weird and throaty. At last, he hit upon a way of agreeing without encouraging Harry more. ‘If I say yes will you leave?’

   He grinned. ‘If you’re sure you want me to.’

   ‘I’m sure,’ Louis said bitingly, folding his arms. ‘Fine then. I’ll come.’

   Harry gave him a shit-eating smile. ‘Not if I leave, you won’t.’

   Louis scowled. ‘Don’t push it, Styles. And you couldn’t make me come if you tried,’ he added in a mutter.

   The effect was instantaneous, and extremely gratifying. Harry looked positively outraged, colour flooding his face. ‘You’re seriously going to make me leave with that? I don’t get a chance to prove you wrong? _Lou...’_

   ‘Out,’ Louis ordered, ignoring the hopeful twitch in his jeans at the idea.

   ‘Fucking fine.’ Huffing, Harry turned to leave, but at the door he looked back. ‘I’m gonna make you eat those words, Lou.’ His eyes glinted. ‘And that’s not all you’re gonna swallow.’

_‘Get out!’_


	5. I Wouldn't Mind Tasting Myself On You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick pays Harry for knock-knock jokes (and probably also for sex). Louis plays Shakespeare and Perrie plays his boyfriend. Louis tries to help Harry, and Harry tries to distract him. Things don’t exactly go as planned, but at least Zayn, Liam and Niall sleep through it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm so bad at writing smut i'm so sorry. i'm gonna hope the angst is satisfying enough on its own...

Louis hadn’t spoken to Harry Styles for three days.

 The dimpled little shit had ended up taking him to his precious radio show to meet Nick, or ‘Grimmy’ as he called him. The second the man saw Louis, his eyes lit up like fucking fairy lights and from then on he referred to him exclusively as ‘the twink’. Which, naturally, Styles found hilarious. Louis didn’t find it remotely funny. Nor did he find it remotely funny when he discovered the source of Harry’s change in tone while talking into the mic: Nick touched him under the table, palming over his trousers, moving his hand every time he opened his mouth. That plus the sleazy atmosphere of the tiny, cramped studio – plus the fact that they were sharing a mic and practically kissing around it whenever the opportunity arose – was enough to ensure that Louis bolted the second Nick announced the break.

   Halfway down the street, he realised that Styles was stumbling behind him like a misshapen giraffe, his long legs managing to match his strides twice over. ‘Lou? Hey, Lou!’

   ‘What?’ Louis snapped, turning on him so fast that that they nearly clonked heads.

   ‘What’s your problem; Nick’s nice.’ He looked genuinely bewildered, his angelic curls all over his sweet baby-doll eyes.

   ‘He called me a twink!’

   ‘It’s a _compliment._ It means you’re pretty.’

   ‘I’m. Not. Pretty,’ Louis spat through gritted teeth.

   Harry took a step closer, eyes narrowing slightly. ‘I beg to differ.’

   Uncomfortably close. Louis edged away. Then he ran. He heard Harry calling, but he didn’t look back.

   And he hadn’t spoken to him since. He’d sent Louis six texts on Sunday, and a further eight on Monday (he’d taken a sick day for a cold), all along the lines of **_Lou?_** , ** _Looooooou?_** and ** _Loou I’m booored talk to meeee._** Immeasurably satisfying to delete.

   Louis was still in shock from watching him being felt up like that. Did Harry not care that his arousal was evident in every syllable he spoke? Did he relish being pawed like that in a dingy little room by a thirty-year-old man with unfortunate teeth and a bad haircut? Was that what he wanted?

   He had told Louis that Nick paid him. He hadn’t told him exactly what for. And it didn’t take a genius to figure out that it wasn’t for his quick wit: the height of his humour was a selection of unbelievably unfunny knock-knock jokes, three of which he’d managed to fit in during the short segment I’d observed. Each one had earned him an extra squeeze from Nick, eliciting a pitchy gasp that had had Louis’s legs pressing together too. He’d just sounded so fucking _vulnerable._ And God help him, that should not have been so attractive.

   He’d barely touched him and Harry was already corrupting him, his dark desires swallowing Louis whole. And it scared him.

   Which was why he hadn’t spoken to him for three days.

   The thing is, it was starting to make Louis twitchy. He was used to hearing Harry’s voice. He was used to his silly Snapchats. He’d grown accustomed to his face.

   Which, of course, only scared him more.

   Harry didn’t text him on Tuesday, but Zayn did. **_Mate? If you’re up to it Niall wants us at his house after school for auditions. We’ve basically assigned parts but it’s so we can meet the girls._**

   Louis stared at the screen for about ten seconds. Now there were girls?

   But he had bigger problems.

   _Why_ hadn’t Harry texted him? Was two days’ ignoring enough to make him give up? Was he simply used to being the one chased? Louis wouldn’t know; he’d had no experience of either.

   Nevertheless, he dragged himself out of bed, brushed his hair until it was shining and pulled on his brightest pair of skinny jeans (crimson and, according to Zayn, ‘unbearable’) and one of the three brand T-shirts he owned, courtesy of his father’s singular surprise visit when he was thirteen.

   And he absolutely wasn’t dressing up because Harry would be there. Where the fuck do you get your information from?

   He knew the way to Niall’s house backwards by now, but he took his time. It was a beautiful walk, once out of his crappy council estate and off the main road. Harry and Niall lived far further North, where dusty pavement melted into private parks and shabby flats morphed into huge, ornate houses on silent streets where camera crews came to film the only part of England mainstream movies cared about: the upper class.

   Camera crews came to Louis’s end of London too, but exclusively for documentaries. He’d even been interviewed for a couple here and there. The usual shit about shoplifting and cynicism and school. Nothing ever came of them. Go figure.

   Niall’s house was only slighter smaller than Harry’s, and the lion’s head knocker shook the entire door when Louis gave it three brisk taps against the polished green wood.

   Styles opened the door, and a crippling numbness shot through each of Louis’s knees like an arrow.

   Harry’s eyebrows raised in a rare moment of surprise – and then he leant against the door frame with a smirk. ‘Can I help you, stranger?’

   ‘Quit messing around.’

   He squinted exaggeratedly, his dimples the only sign of how much he was enjoying this. ‘No…I’m afraid I don’t know you. Hey, are you that stripper Niall ordered?’

   ‘Shut _up.’_

Louis tried to push past him, but his slender frame was strong and he blocked his way. ‘Because you could have chosen a kinkier outfit. Like a sexy nurse…or a teacher.’

   Louis’s stomach squeezed. ‘Yeah, we all know how much you like teachers,’ he snapped, to mask his discomfort. ‘Now let me through, you sick creep.’

   Miraculously, Harry’s body yielded, and Louis shoved him aside. Serve him right for being aggressive. Serve him right for calling Louis a stripper.

   ‘Nice skin, Lou,’ he heard him murmur.

   Burning, Louis yanked the hem of his T-shirt down before ducking into the sitting room.

   Serve him right for trying to look good for him.

 

*

Eleanor, Perrie and Danielle turned out to be not so bad. Louis had taken to Perrie instantly: a peroxide-blonde lesbian with a tongue as sharp as the five spikes in her left ear. Eleanor was a different story; soft and sweet and shy – but she had kind eyes and a ready smile which was more than could be said for Danielle, who had apparently had ‘a fucking joke of a day’, and spent most of their meeting sitting with her arms folded, grilling Niall about Liam. Louis gathered that they’d broken up a couple of weeks before. Luckily, Liam had not been enlisted for the play.

   Zayn must have talked Louis up like a motherfucker because he’d been given the main part no questions asked. Eleanor was to be his female co-star; Perrie his male. Meanwhile Danielle and Harry had agreed to be the choreographed ‘chorus’. Niall was directing and Zayn would spray paint the set. The latter two had explained their decisions with pride – or Niall had anyway – and then they had settled down to discuss the script.

   Five snarky comments from Danielle later, they’d given up on that and broken out the booze instead.

   To make up for it, Zayn and Niall were giving Louis a run-through of it now, Wednesday lunchtime. Harry wasn’t there yet, having been called to wait behind after Philosophy by Flack, who Louis was truly starting to hate in a dull, petty, bitter way. Nevertheless, he was masking his irritation in order to pay attention to Zayn, who he’d never seen look so animated. Niall was gazing at him, obviously awestruck by his beauty, which seemed impossibly magnified by the passion in his face. ‘So, you know how in the sonnets Shakespeare’s basically lamenting over a boy he can’t be with, and then eventually he gives it up and has this really intense love-hate relationship with a woman? It’s basically that. I sort of tried to write dialogue that reflected the poetical style of the sonnets but in modern language, and I probably failed spectacularly but –’

   ‘Mate!’ Niall objected.

   ‘Niall seems to like it,’ he finished with a wry smile. ‘So, yeah. I suppose that makes you Shakespeare, Louis.’

   Louis gave him a sitting sweeping bow, dipping his nose theatrically right into the puddle of gravy left on his plate. ‘I am honoured, kind sir. Your faith shall not be betrayed nor your vision compromised while I am in your favour.’

   ‘Good to know,’ Zayn replied, smiling as he handed Louis a napkin. ‘And Perrie’s what is most commonly referred to as ‘the Fair Youth’, but whom I thought for argument’s sake I’d take Oscar Wilde at his word and portray as William Hughes. For the ‘Dark Lady’ I took a blind stab and chose Mary Fitton. Apparently Eleanor’s got a flair for creepy female characters.’

   ‘She does,’ Niall clarified with his mouth full. ‘Last year they put on _Sleeping Beauty_ and cast her as Maleficent. Stellar choice. She murdered it. I’ll show you sometime, when she’s out of the room of course.’

   Louis could see all of Zayn’s teeth; he was smiling so wide. His eyes had gone all crinkly and it was fucking adorable. He really was blindingly gorgeous. ‘I really owe you one for letting me do this, mate,’ he told Niall. ‘I know your drama department could have got you the rights to Les Mis or something like that.’

   Niall snorted. ‘Nah, who wants to put on something that’s been done before? You’re the one who saved my life, honestly. The techies would have murdered me and Harry if we hadn’t put on a play this year. They’ve been begging us to do it ever since we worked on _Sleeping Beauty_ but I just couldn’t be arsed to play around with any of those stupid musicals. There’s no new way to do ’em so why bother? Harry felt the same way so –’

   ‘Harry felt the same way about what?’

   Louis glanced up at Harry, glanced back at Zayn. Then he did a double-take.

   Styles was wearing lipstick. And not just any lipstick. Flack’s, recognisable instantly for its glossy brown finish. He had it smeared all around his mouth like a goddamn prostitute.

   ‘For Christ’s sake, Styles,’ Niall hissed, having caught on to it and recovered far quicker than Louis. ‘Wipe your fucking mouth.’

   ‘Huh? Oh.’ Absently, Harry drew the back of his hand across his stained lips and then grinned. ‘Better?’

   Niall rolled his eyes, but warmly. ‘Anyone would think you liked the attention. But seriously, you should be more careful.’

   ‘Why?’ He fixed his green gaze on Louis, hard and defiant. ‘It’s no fucking secret I like teachers, is it?’

   ‘Shut _up.’_ Niall yanked him onto the bench and shoved a piece of bread in his mouth. ‘I know what you’re like but it might surprise you to know that it’ll hurt her more than you if anyone finds out.’

   ‘Is that a bad thing?’ Louis muttered. ‘Paedophiles probably shouldn’t be around teenage boys whether they’re shagging them or not.’

   A sharp pain stabbed him through the leg, and it took him longer than it should have to register that it was Harry who’d kicked him. Harry who was glaring at him like it was his mother Louis had insulted. Harry who snapped ‘Talk about her like that again and I’ll fuck you up. Got it?’

   Louis stared at him. The shock of Harry’s kick was still shuddering through him, and he could feel tears in his eyes threatening to spill. Niall was blinking rapidly, clearly at a complete loss.

   ‘Touch my friend again,’ Zayn suddenly interjected calmly, having looked on in silence this entire time, ‘in any way he doesn’t want you to, and I’ll kill you.’

   He was back to his old serious self, but with an entirely new air of aggression Louis had only rarely seen in him before, once when he’d been vetting his little sister’s boyfriend and once more when a gang of guys in their old school had called Louis a faggot. Suffice it to say they’d never dared so much as look at him the wrong way ever again. Zayn was scary when he was angry, and he knew it. That he’d risked their still-fresh friendship with Harry and Niall for Louis’s sake made him want to reach across the table and hug him.

   But before he could, Harry caved. ‘I’m sorry, Lou. That was out of order.’

   ‘It’s OK,’ Louis murmured, too tired to hold it against him.

   Zayn wasn’t having any, though. The fire in his eyes had turned blue. ‘Yeah, you should be.’

   Harry sighed. Then he stood up, muttered ‘Sorry,’ one more time and walked away.

   ‘Sorry,’ Zayn said, and for a moment Louis was confused until he realised he was talking to Niall.

   ‘Hey, no worries man,’ Niall assured him. ‘You gotta do what you gotta do. You OK, Louis? I should have said, he can get really defensive. He’s right though, that was completely out of order –’

   ‘It’s OK,’ Louis repeated listlessly. The pain had faded. All that was left was the shock.

   That night, Harry called him. He was preoccupied with homework so he sent him to voicemail. To his surprise, he actually did what he was told for once and left a message. _‘Hey Lou. Listen, I was a twat earlier. And I have been for ages. Fuck it, I am a twat but I like you a lot and I hope you still like me too. Which, I guess isn’t really a likelihood since you’re not picking up. Ugh, what the hell do you want me to say? I’m sorry, alright? I’m a fucked up person and I do fucked up things and I fuck up, all the time. Is that what you want to hear? I fucking well hope so because I don’t know what else I’m supposed to say. Except I’m sorry if Grimmy freaked you out as well. I know he comes across a little…sleazy. Hell, he is. That’s pretty much the kind of person I attract. And I like being attractive. Does that make me a slut, Lou? Do you think I’m a slut? Maybe I bloody well am.’_ Pause. _‘I guess we can add this to the list of examples of me fucking up. Bye then.’_

   Louis replayed it. Eight times. He counted every crack in his deep, rolling voice. He jerked off to his sprawling drawl like he had so many times before. He slept for an hour. And then he called him back. ‘Hi Haz.’

   Harry sounded sleepy, but happy to hear his voice. ‘You’re calling me Haz now?’

   ‘I guess.’

   ‘Does that mean you’re not mad?’

   ‘I suppose.’

   ‘Talk to me, Lou. Are we friends?’

   ‘I never said we weren’t.’

   ‘You’ve been treating me like a disease all week. And I know I’ve been a dick, I’m not contesting that, but I just want to know if I’ve completely ruined our relationship.’

   ‘No.’

   ‘OK. That’s good.’ Silence, then a sigh. ‘I’m tired, Lou. Really tired. Do you want to talk?’

   ‘I guess not.’

   ‘In that case I’m going to go to sleep.’

   ‘OK.’

   ‘OK. Night.’

   ‘Night.’

   Louis hung up.

   He didn’t know why he was being so difficult. He had forgiven Harry, really. It was a decent apology, more than anything he would have expected from him. But he made Louis mad, for reasons he still couldn’t pinpoint, and hearing him so late at night, sounding all loose and dreamy, was too much for him to handle because he sounded like someone he could actually…well. Care about. Protect. Love.

 

*

By Friday night, Harry and Louis had settled into an uneasy amiability, although Zayn was still eyeing the former with warning signs evident in his eyes. Perhaps that was why he hadn’t been touching Louis, at all, even when they were alone. Perhaps, Louis dared to think (if not quite hope), their brief whatever-it-was was over.

   That evening they’d all met up at his house pre-club and warmed themselves up to the sound of Britney Spears – and, when Harry had finally wrestled Niall away from the radio, Arctic Monkeys. There’d been a brief awkward moment when the others had left them in his room by themselves but even as Louis had glanced warily at the taboo drawer, Harry had simply handed him a pair of his stupidly skinny jeans, without so much as one word about how they’d look clinging to Louis’s arse.

   He was leering a little now, but Louis couldn’t really hold it against him. They were both drunk and it was dark and he wasn’t to know that Louis was watching him as he danced, something stubbornly deliberate in the way he was moving his hips, almost as if it were for Harry’s benefit. They weren’t close enough to touch, but enough that, if Louis wanted to, he could have looked him in the eye.

   He did want to. Harry’s green eyes were saturated in lust and longing, and it was just making Louis want to tease him more. He pressed his T-shirt against his stomach, sweat making it almost see-through. He bent his legs, a ridiculous endeavour in Harry’s jeans, and let his fingers play along the edge of the waistband, almost a request. And no, he wasn’t ashamed of himself for playing up to him. Harry was hard to resist sober. He was impossible to resist drunk.

   Then Harry jumped a mile as a hand grabbed him from behind. Louis started forward automatically, but he shook his head frantically so he hung back just a little, ready to move if Harry needed his help.

   Then he recognised the face of the boy now pushing up against Harry the way he’d done to Louis that first night, but far more aggressive. He was one of the guys in their class, Tom Parker; the one who’d boasted that day that Harry Styles never said no.

   But he was saying no now. He was struggling. But the other boy was stronger and he had his hands around Harry’s waist and his mouth to his ear. Louis made to step in once more but again, Harry shook his head.

   _Niall?_ Louis mouthed.

   _Go,_ he mouthed back.

   No way in hell was Louis going to leave him there though. Steeling himself, he marched toward them and grabbed Parker’s wrist. ‘Let him go.’

   He gave Louis a confused look, dopey with drink and most likely drugs as well. ‘Why?’

   ‘Because he wants you to.’

   He smirked, squeezing Harry harder. ‘Oh, I know he wants it.’

   ‘Fuck off you creep,’ Harry snapped.

   The thing was, it was unclear whom he was talking to. For a moment Louis felt a little sick at the thought that maybe, just maybe, he wanted this.

   ‘Be nice,’ Parker reprimanded, this time gripping so hard that he elicited a gasp from Louis’s friend’s throat.

   Protective instinct welled up inside of Louis like the sea, and before he could even think about it he’d clenched his fist and punched Parker straight in the shoulder. ‘I said let. Him. Go.’

   He stumbled, but he didn’t let go so when he crashed to the ground he took Harry with him still fighting. They landed in a tangle and Parker took the opportunity to slip his hands under Harry’s shirt. ‘Come on, slut,’ he slurred. ‘Show me how much you want it. Show me like you show Grimmy and Ben, yeah? Come on. Show me.’

   _‘Fuck off!’_ Harry yelled. With a massive effort, he wrenched himself away from the other boy and pulled himself to his feet. He was flushed and trembling with humiliation and something else that Louis couldn’t quite place, but it looked almost like fear. ‘Come on, Lou. Let’s get out of here.’

   ‘Harry –’ He was flushed pink and he sounded like he was going to cry and Louis wanted to hug him. Which was a very new and strange experience for him that he wouldn’t have minded exploring at all.

   ‘Could you just find the others? I need…I need some air. I’ll be in the car.’

   ‘Mate, are you OK?’

   _‘Please._ Just. Leave me alone.’

   Then he ran.

 

*

‘I could have taken care of myself, you know. And I wouldn’t have ended up on the floor.’

   There was an obvious innuendo to make but Louis didn’t want to risk it. Harry still looked a little fragile.

   The five of them were back at his house again. They’d ended up playing Spin the Bottle. To Louis’s delight, Liam had agreed to participate, his first spin had landed on Zayn and their – albeit slightly awkward – locking of lips had proven what he’d already known: that they were the hottest couple under the sun.

   In fact they’d all managed to take a turn with everybody else, which had been interesting to say the least. Zayn and Louis, of course, had had kissing down to an art from all their ‘innocent’ practises when they were younger. They’d snogged for about ten seconds until Zayn pulled away with a smirk.

   Niall and Liam were both good kissers, but nothing special. Niall had insisted on playfully running his palms up and down Louis’s sides like they were making out, while Liam had obviously had no idea where to put his hands so settled for politely holding them up in the air.

   It had been weird watching Harry kiss Zayn. They had clearly both been wildly uncomfortable and in the end Zayn had nipped his tongue and he’d withdrawn with a cry.

   When Harry had got Louis, though, Louis had nearly chickened out. Harry appeared inexplicably nervous too, licking his bitten lips as they came closer together. Niall had looked like his heart was in his mouth as much as Louis’s was – but in the end it hadn’t been too intense, just a quick peck. Liam had started to protest that they were cheating, but Niall had cleared his throat loudly and then shaken his head.

   Now everyone else was asleep, leaving just Louis and Harry still sitting up on his window seat, bundled up in a single blanket and staring out at the stars, wondrously visible in this part of London, so far removed from the urban orange glow of the sky outside Louis’s window.

   Louis glanced at the others, on the floor. Niall and Zayn were slumped with their heads together, having been discussing ‘official play business’, while Liam was spread out on the carpet beside them. Louis thought about artfully moving Zayn into his arms, to give them some sort of incentive, but decided against it, since he’d promised Zayn no pranks. Instead, he turned back to Harry. His pale skin was almost luminescent in the gloom. ‘Maybe, but I was worried.’

   ‘Watch it,’ Harry warned, grinning. ‘Keep being sweet and I might get the wrong idea.’

   ‘Yeah well, that’s your problem,’ Louis retorted, only half-joking. ‘Is that why you’re so aggressive? Because that’s how people treat you?’

   He groaned. ‘You sound like my therapist. There’s no deep fucking reason for me being a twat, Lou, I just am. And I said I was sorry.’

   ‘Did your Mummy tell you apologies make everything better?’

   ‘Hey.’

   ‘Sorry,’ Louis said quickly. ‘But seriously mate, we can’t be friends if you keep –’

   ‘Want to play Spin the Bottle?’

   Louis frowned, taken aback by the sudden change of subject. ‘Didn’t we just –’

   ‘Your lips taste nice. Let’s see if I get lucky again.’

   ‘Umm…’

   ‘Come on Lou, please?’ Harry gazed at him beseechingly. ‘I just want to forget about Parker. Look.’ He lifted his shirt slightly, and a set of purple bruises either side of his hips threw Louis off his guard. ‘Help me forget about him?’

   Louis’s vision was blurring. ‘Harry, he hurt you –’

   Then Harry was clambering off the seat, grabbing the bottle and flicking it so it spun, around and around and around until he stopped it pointing squarely in Louis’s direction, looked up at him and murmured ‘The bottle says we have to kiss.’

   Well the bottle did say so. So when Harry stood up shakily and walked over to him, Louis held out his arms, and his back arched as Harry put his hands on his hips, and his mouth opened even before he pressed their lips together.

   Talk about fucking desperate.

   But he tasted so good, like vodka and sugar and sex all at once, a reminder of those school cookies Louis now couldn’t get enough of. Dangerous and inadvisable and unhealthy, but so, so good.

   He moaned quietly into Louis’s mouth. ‘Jesus Christ Lou, you’re going to fucking kill me.’

   ‘Shut up,’ Louis muttered, one hand finding the back of Harry’s neck and the other a handful of his shirt so he could pull him closer, and when that didn’t work wrapping his legs around his waist like a skinny girl in an indie movie.

   Harry laughed, low and abruptly mean-spirited. ‘Are you gonna be eating those words now, Lou?’

   Louis hesitated. ‘What –’

   Abruptly, Harry tore Louis’s T-shirt off over his head and grabbed his arse, gripping tight as he lifted Louis up so he could lay him on the floor and kiss his way down the middle of his chest and then his stomach, licking playfully at the strip of sparse hair trailing from his navel, until his mouth made contact with his zip. Louis screamed as silently as he could, but a high-pitched squeak still sounded and Harry looked up, and Louis had never seen anything sexier in his life than Harry Styles’ face smiling up at him from between his legs, his breath blazing hot against the denim of his jeans.

   He didn’t ask. But Louis didn’t say no. So Harry kept going, pulling Louis’s trousers down and then his boxers, and for a moment Louis froze, in case he laughed or stopped, but he just stared at him for a while, his eyes glittering hungrily, then he wrapped his lips around him and went down and fuck he’d done this before because Louis could feel the back of his throat within seconds and he wasn’t even gagging, but even if he had been Louis wasn’t sure he’d care because _fuck,_ it was the best thing he’d ever felt in his life, better than cookies, better than kisses, better than breathing.

   Then he pulled off and Louis thought that might be it and he burned at the thought that Harry was going to leave him like this for the rest of his life, knowing he’d go mad living with the memory, but as it turned out that wasn’t in fact the end. It was the beginning.

 It was clumsy and uninspired and standard as far as sex goes. Harry helped Louis wriggle out of his clothes completely and then he opened his legs up for him. Louis’s spine was racing with chills and heat, his breath was drying up, and goosebumps were rising on his skin – and that was before it occurred to him that Zayn, Liam and Niall were still sleeping just a few feet away.

   Harry looked him over a while longer, and Louis felt his whole body turning slowly crimson at how exposed he was, whereas Harry was still fully clothed. He murmured something that sounded like _bloody fucking beautiful_ and then he unbuttoned his own jeans, almost simultaneously pulling a condom out of his pocket. At the sight of it Louis’s brain just about short-circuited at the now firm knowledge that yep, this was happening, he was about to have sex with Harry Styles, but then it basically exploded when he saw Harry’s cock for the second time, just as hard as it had been in that Snapchat but even more intimidating in real life.

   Then _‘Fuck,’_ he mumbled, and he looked as crestfallen as a child told they weren’t allowed to play with their favourite toy, ‘I don’t have any bloody lube.’

   Louis couldn’t help it. The spell was broken and he arched his back again and laughed, laughed until his stomach hurt. The boy had a drawer full of fucking dildos but he didn’t think to stock up on lube.

   Harry pouted, the expression ridiculous with his dick still hard against his stomach. ‘S’not funny.’

   And, fucking hell, Louis actually felt sorry for him, he looked so disappointed.

   ‘Here,’ he said, and although he had absolutely no idea how to do it, or why he would want to do it for Harry fucking-dimples-and-green-eyes Styles, he sat up, folded his knees underneath him, and took Harry’s cock in his mouth, hollowing his cheeks the way he’d seen befringed boys do in porn, even looking up at him with Bambi eyes in case he found that sexy.

   Evidently he did, because he came within minutes, right down Louis’s throat with absolutely no warning, fisting his hands in his hair to hold his head in place.

   Oddly, Louis didn’t really mind. Harry had a nice dick, velvet-soft and heavy on his tongue, and his come was salty but not unpleasant. Automatically, he swallowed.

   Just as, he realised with a slightly sinking feeling, Harry had always known he would.

   But Harry didn’t gloat. He didn’t even smirk. He just bent his head, his mouth already opening to press a kiss to Louis’s wet, stained lips.

   Startled, Louis pulled away, blurting out ‘But…you’ll taste yourself.’

   Mentally he kicked himself. Had anyone ever said anything more stupidly _innocent?_

   Harry just smiled, and in that moment the look in his eyes was so soft, so fond, that it warmed Louis’s heart. ‘I wouldn’t mind tasting myself on you.’

   So they kissed, and Harry’s hand found Louis’s cock and jacked him off with quick, strong strokes until he came all over their stomachs, harder than he ever had before (Harry’s hands were fucking huge; twice the size of Louis’s).

   After some half-hearted dabbing with the T-shirt Harry was still wearing, which he then abandoned in favour of sleeping naked, he pulled Louis into his bedroom and his bed and wrapped his arms around him, nuzzling his slightly sweaty hair.

   And it would have been perfect, but for the one thing Harry murmured before they drifted off to sleep.

   ‘I’m glad we’re friends again, Lou.’


	6. Paw Me, Claw Me, Make Me Bleed For You Baby

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry likes sex. A lot. Shakespeare’s identity is posthumously erased. Zayn is surprised to find out the conspiracy behind Soylent Green. Starbucks and Snapchat both fall prey to Harry’s libido.

Louis wraps his arms around his knees where he’s pulled them up to his chest on the brown leather sofa. ‘It was my fault. I should have said no.’

   ‘Why do you say that?’ his therapist says softly. She says everything softly. She has a soft voice. She also has soft hair, soft eyes, a soft mouth, and a soft white dog sleeping in her lap.

   Louis likes her. Soft is what he needs right now. ‘Niall warned me. The thing about Harry is, if you say yes once then you’ve said it indefinitely.’

   ‘And why is that your fault?’

   He shakes his head, looking away out the window, where silver rain cries patterns on the glass. ‘It just is.’

   ‘So what happened then?’ she asks, her hand gently kneading the fluffy fur of her dog. ‘You just went back to being friends?’

   ‘Yep,’ he says dully, resting his chin on his knees. ‘’Cept now we were friends who fucked.’

   ‘And you wanted that?’

   He frowns. ‘Yeah,’ he says eventually. ‘I mean…yeah, I liked fucking him. It was fun and it felt good. Until…until it didn’t.’

   ‘And when was that?’ she says softly.

   He sighs. ‘When he started to hurt me.’

 

*

Fade in a month later, and Louis was on his knees.

   He would have made some smart remark about Harry’s carpet being fucking murder on his bare skin, but he was preoccupied. And there was a ball gag in his mouth.

   On second thoughts, maybe we should backtrack.

   So, they’d had sex. That had happened. To be honest, Louis still hadn’t gotten over that, no matter how many times it had happened since. Like. He’d had sex. With Harry Styles. He wasn’t quite sure which of those statements were the more surprising. Not that he’d had much time to think about any of that. He was kind of busy. Having sex with Harry Styles.

   That boy was absolutely in love with sex. And all its most sinister trappings. And with whoever would give it to him. Which had turned out to include, as far as Louis could gather, Flack, Nick Grimshaw, and someone else Harry had only ever got as far as calling ‘Ben’.

   Not Parker, though. Not any of the boys at school. Just Louis. Absurd as it sounded, he held onto that. It was pretty much the only thing about this situation that made him feel any sort of special. If it hadn’t been for that, he would be feeling pretty shit about the whole thing. Well, not necessarily the sex. Just the fact that he was always off having it with someone else.

   But today he’d decided to have it with Louis so there they were, fresh out of school and locked in Harry’s bedroom with indie rock blaring to drown out the noises he never failed to tear out of Louis, even bound and gagged. Which he was. Incidentally.

   Harry, on the other hand, was completely free, not to mention stark naked. He was lounging on his bed watching him, the Dimples of Death sharp and defined in his otherwise poker face. ‘You’ve been a bad boy, Lou.’

   Yeah, he was into that. Holy shit was he into that.

   ‘I guess I’m gonna have to punish you.’ His eyes were glinting like fucking diamonds. He was gorgeous; a shining expanse of smooth, creamy skin, stretched taut here and there over muscles and the nubs of his bones. Parker’s bruises had faded, but there were scratches on his back from Flack and a lovebite on his hip from Grimshaw. Ben didn’t tend to leave marks, Louis had noticed, but he did leave him walking weirdly for a day or so after. Louis had pieced together this information by documenting who Harry left him for when he left and what he looked like immediately after coming back. He didn’t have anything else to work with: Harry would never tell him anything about them. That was why he was in this position actually: he’d asked.

   ‘What have I told you, Lou? What do I keep telling you?’

   He was teasing. Obviously Louis couldn’t answer, silenced by the gag. He just blinked up at him stupidly, his jaw aching from the device strapped into his mouth.

   ‘My lovers are _my private business.’_ His tone was playfully father-like, but Louis could see he was serious.

   He knelt, mirroring him, reached out and pulled at the strap of the gag so it came briefly away, just long enough for him to ask Louis to repeat it and him to comply, his eyes watering. ‘Your private business.’

   ‘That’s my good boy.’ He replaced the wad of red rubber so it was between Louis’s teeth and then put his hand in Louis’s hair, dragging his nails right across his scalp so his fringe was pushed back and he was completely exposed. Louis tried to drop his eyes, but when Harry pinched his nipple his gaze snapped straight back up. ‘None of that,’ Harry reprimanded sternly, the corners of his mouth twitching. ‘I want to see your pretty face. Now.’ He pulled harder at Louis’s hair, so his head was forced up until all Harry could probably see was his throat, his chin, and the top of his nose. ‘Mmm. You know Lou, I’m very hungry. Now that I think about it, I skipped lunch.’ Louis shivered as he licked a stripe up from his collarbones to his neck. ‘You look so yummy, Lou. I’m just gonna have a taste, yeah?’

   Louis tried to brace himself, but Harry’s teeth sinking into his flesh still made him tense up like a fist clenching, even as it sent sparks of pleasure darting through his blood. He could hear his own desperate noises even through the gag, and he knew that Harry was loving it.

Once Harry started, he always seemed to find it very difficult to stop. Louis wore vanilla cologne and he couldn’t get enough of it. He was always nibbling him and Louis liked it but it was different when he really got to work. It was like he was trying to tear chunks straight off of him. He’d never drawn blood, but Louis was always shocked afterward when he looked into the mirror, partly because it looked so bad and partly because he always thought it would look worse. It hurt like all fucking hell but Louis’s hands were quite literally tied and he had no way of stopping him.

   He never told Harry afterwards how much it hurt. He didn’t want to begrudge him, because he loved it so much. It was a good feeling, making him happy. It was addictive.

   Louis had fashioned a weird kind of coping mechanism for the pain. He’d talk to Harry in his head, just a constant stream of jabber, the kind that would have irritated him if he’d had the capacity to say it aloud. It was weird, but he wasn’t himself when he was in that much agony and frustration and _want,_ and the stupidest things would come storming into his head like arrows in his skull, splintering his sanity. He’d tell Harry he loved him. He’d beg him to stop, and then not to stop. He’d offer him anything; everything if he’d just hold him and kiss him and make promises he wouldn’t keep just to make him feel safe. And every so often this surreal, odd mantra would spiral across his mind like a firework.

   _Paw me, claw me, make me bleed for you baby._

   Eventually, Harry was satisfied. And then the part that Louis truly loved was allowed to take place. He untied him, kissing all the marks he’d inflicted. He lifted Louis up onto his bed and laid him out, artfully arranging him until it felt like he was planning to paint him. He very gently released Louis’s mouth and pressed it against his own, exploring all the sore spots with his tongue as his hands softly kneaded his trembling body until he was nearly crying with relief and overstimulation. Then he opened up Louis’s legs the way he did, like his favourite book, and fucked him slowly, carefully, as if he were made of glass.

   Louis used the word fuck because that was all it was, no matter how sweetly he did it and how much Louis couldn’t deny that he loved being completely spread open and filled and claimed by him. He couldn’t ever let himself forget that, because it would only hurt more when they were spent and sated and Harry would go and get a washcloth of warm water and clean Louis up like a child, and then murmur ‘I have to go. Grimy wants to record some stuff for tomorrow’s show. Make yourself some food, yeah?’

   He’d kiss Louis’s forehead before he left, still damp with perspiration and pain. Sometimes he’d even play with his hair for a while, enjoying the purring sounds Louis would make and calling him kitten, in a way that was half fond and half teasing. But he’d still leave, the music still blaring and Louis comatose on his bed, not fully returned from wherever he’d go when he peaked.

   He never took anything from Harry’s fridge. He already felt like enough of a rent boy lying on his silk sheets staring up at his ridiculously high ceiling, with a glass of water on the bedside table and his taste fresh in his mouth. He wasn’t about to go down to his kitchen, scruffy and used, and risk being mistaken for the slutty nephew of his cleaner or whatever. So, as soon as he could stand up, he left too.

 

*

Louis’s life outside of school wasn’t entirely consumed by his excursions with Harry Styles, you understand. The second most important thing in his life at that time was rehearsing for Zayn’s play. Having arranged the cast, he and Niall had taken the script to the school and they’d grudgingly approved it, provided he didn’t explicitly state that the characters involved were Shakespeare and his various speculative lovers. Zayn was irritated but he agreed – and proceeded to thrown absolutely any and all references to the Bard’s plays he could think of into the script just to make it that much more obvious that he was indeed the muse for the protagonist. However, Niall had reluctantly insisted that he tweak the setting slightly so that it be set in a school in the present day. That wasn’t what surprised Louis, though. What surprised him was that Zayn had agreed to that too.

   ‘You’re really OK with this?’ he’d asked him a couple of times as he slashed lines from the script to add allusions to classes and school trips and social lives.

   ‘Niall knows what he’s doing,’ would be his only response.

   It was lucky that Louis had Harry (in as much as he had him anyway) because he was starting to feel like Niall was becoming more of a best friend to Zayn than he was. Not that he blamed either of them, given how close he and Harry had evidently become. It still hurt a little though, that Zayn had apparently replaced him with such ease. The separation was especially evident in the main hall during rehearsals, when Zayn and Niall would sit behind a double desk making notes as Eleanor, Perrie and Louis acted out their parts in front of them and Danielle and Harry swayed prettily in the background. In despair at their superfluousness, Zayn had even written them some lines outside their melodic recitals of the sonnets but it was probably a good thing that they’d refused: neither of them could act to save their lives.

   Today they were going over the opening scenes, when Louis’s character first met Perrie’s and started to admire him from afar while Harry and Danielle murmured sporadic lines from sonnets 1-17 in his ear (demonstrating, Zayn explained, how love was taking over his mind).

   This arrangement, of course, delighted Harry no end. As he danced around Louis, at intervals he would reach out and slyly pinch or scratch him. His aim, Louis gathered, was to startle him enough to make him yelp, which didn’t happen too often as he was watching Harry like a hawk, but enough to keep him satisfied and smirking all the way through.

   Louis didn’t know whether Niall and Zayn noticed. They kept their eyes down for the most part, only glancing up if a line was messed up or they’d come up with another brilliant idea for staging. For Harry, this was perfect.

 Except that one time Perrie noticed and hissed. ‘Oi, Styles. Keep your hands to yourself.’

   ‘Come off it Pez-Dispenser, it’s just a game.’

   She gave Louis a quizzical look, and the last thing he wanted was more drama so he just nodded even though he could feel a bruise blackening on his forearm from Harry’s last go at his ‘game’.

   She cornered Louis after rehearsals in the locker room, releasing her white-blonde hair from the baseball cap Niall crammed it into before every scene for ‘authenticity’ so it swirled around her shoulders, soft and safe. ‘So. What’s Hazza up to with you?’

   Throat constricting, Louis shrugged.

   She tilted her head, suddenly concerned. ‘Babes? Hey, it’s alright. We all know he’s a little shit. Just don’t let him push you around, K?’ Cheerfully, she ruffled his hair. ‘You’re awesome, by the way. See you later babe!’

   Then she was gone in a whirl of the purple sequins from her scarf.

   The next thing Louis knew, Harry was by his side instead. ‘Hey Lou.’

   Louis wasn’t sure why but at that moment he just really needed some reassurance that Harry wanted him for something other than the pain he could inflict on him; that he actually liked him beyond making him squirm; that they were wrong about him being bad news. ‘Can we go for a drink or something?’

   He pulled a face. ‘Sorry mate, Mrs Flack’s got the monopoly on me tonight. I’ll talk to you later, though. Hey, I think Niall and Zayn are doing something; why don’t you go with them?’

   He must have thought Louis adequately dismissed, because with a quick hug he was gone too.

 

*

Louis had to run after Niall and Zayn, who were already exiting the building sharing an umbrella under the sudden downpour. They seemed surprised to see him, but happy enough to let him tag along. Louis wouldn’t normally have reduced himself to scraping in but he didn’t want to be alone. Sex seemed to have made him creepily co-dependent. But he figured if he couldn’t scrape in with his best friend, what was the point of having one in the first place?

  To his surprise, they headed back to Zayn’s house. Louis hadn’t realised he’d introduced Niall to ‘their end’ of London. He certainly hadn’t made any move toward it with Harry. He’d have been mortified to introduce him to his cramped, fourth-floor-flat world.

   And yet Niall didn’t seem to mind at all. He didn’t even flinch when they entered the lift and were hit in the face by the overpowering smells of piss and fried chicken, or when the doorbell didn’t work so they had to hammer on the door until the Hoover switched off on the other side and Zayn’s mum let us in, still in her apron from her waitressing job, her face twisted with her recent stroke. He simply smiled at her beatifically and gratefully accepted her offer of biscuits and orange juice. And in Zayn’s tiny room, brimming over with the bunk bed he shared with his oldest sister (always out with her friends), he seemed completely at home as he flopped onto the bottom bunk and kicked off his shoes to cross his legs.

   Louis tried to imagine Harry being even half as at ease in his own flat. He failed.

   ‘Alright if we watch a movie, Louis?’ Niall asked, tugging a DVD from his rucksack. ‘Only I’ve been talking _Soylent Green_ up for weeks. Zayn doesn’t know how it ends, can you believe that?’

   Louis rolled his eyes. ‘He’s not really clued up on pop culture.’

   ‘I’m _here,_ you know,’ Zayn grumbled. ‘Are we watching the movie or not?’

   ‘Course we are, mate,’ Niall said cheerfully. ‘Just gotta go to the bathroom.’

   He sauntered confidently out of the room, firmly clarifying that he’d definitely been there before. Louis folded his arms, giving Zayn a searching look. ‘Since when do you guys hang out here?’

   He shrugged, not quite meeting Louis’s eye. ‘Since he likes my house. He says it’s cosy.’

   ‘Oh. That’s sweet.’

   ‘Mmm.’ He smiled a bit, now messing around with his DVD Player, his fringe falling loose and fluffy over his forehead. ‘He is.’

   That reminded Louis of something. ‘So, how are things with you and Liam?’

   Zayn frowned. ‘What do you mean?’

   ‘Come _on.’_

   He shook his head – but Louis saw him blush. ‘Nothing’s going on. Anyway, Liam’s straight.’

   ‘Uh huh. Remember when Stan was straight?’

   He snorted. ‘Stan was in denial; there’s a difference.’

   ‘So who says Liam isn’t? Anyway, even if he is, it’s _you.’_

   ’Louis,’ he muttered in protest, turning an even brighter shade of red.

   At that moment Niall returned to the room, his eyebrows raising at the scene. ‘Everybody OK?’

   ‘Yeah, Louis was just leaving.’ Zayn widened his eyes dramatically at Louis, which he assumed was a joke, or payback.

   ‘Fat chance,’ he retorted, as Niall settled in on his other side. ‘I want to see your face when you find out what’s in Soylent Green.’

   But as it turned out, he didn’t get the chance. Halfway through the movie, his phone buzzed. It was Harry. **_My date had plans with her husband_** ** _L_**

   ‘Flack’s _married?’_ he blurted.

   Niall leant across Zayn to give him a pitying look.

   ‘Never mind.’ **_So?_** Louis sent back. Harry wasn’t about to get any sympathy from him.

   **_Sooo…meet me?_**

   **_I’m not coming all the way to your house._**

**_I’m in the Starbucks near school. Pleeeeease?_ **

   Louis sighed heavily. Why was his abuse of vowels so enticing? **_Fine._** ‘Guys, I’m gonna take off.’

   ‘I wouldn’t indulge him if I were you.’

   ‘Niall, I know what I’m doing.’ Louis grabbed his coat. ‘See you later.’

   Zayn put an arm around him; his introverted version of an embrace. ‘Have fun, mate. Text me later, yeah?’

   ‘OK.’

   Niall stood up to give him a proper hug. Louis let go as quickly as he could. He distrusted Niall because he knew Harry far better than him. If he’d wanted to, he could have told Louis everything about him that could have had him running for the hills. Everything he didn’t want to know. ‘Bye Niall.’

   ‘Bye Louis.’ He gave Louis one last squeeze, and it felt like he might have been about to say something else. But, in fact, he actually let him leave.

   Harry and Louis ended up grinding against each other in the bathroom of the café until they both came, shuddering through their climaxes and then collapsing on the cold, bleached floor. It wasn’t quite a quickie. It was probably way more demeaning than that. But it was fun, in a breathless, terrifying, degrading kind of way.

   ‘Zayn and Niall have been hanging out,’ Louis remarked afterwards, off-hand, as they were dabbing wet tissue against their jeans.

   Harry pinched his waist, smirking over his shoulder at his own reflection in the dingy mirror. ‘Yeah well, I’m working on setting Niall up with Liam.’

   ‘Don’t you dare,’ Louis told his image, not bothering to turn his head.

   ‘Can’t stop me,’ he taunted, sing-song. ‘They’re gonna date…and they’re gonna kiss…and they’re gonna fuck…’

   ‘Oh yeah?’ Without even thinking about it, Louis turned and sank his teeth into Harry’s shoulder.

   And he’d never known anyone could make a noise like that: a carnal hiss of pure arousal. His pupils even dilated a little, black billowing out from green like oil spilled into a stagnant pond.

   Jackpot. ‘Oh, you like that?’

   He scowled darkly. ‘Fuck off.’

 

*

Harry left suspiciously soon after that. Looking back, Louis realised that he’d probably scared him. His surprise attack had caused Harry to let his guard down, and given him ammunition against him – or at least that’s how he would have seen it. And he didn’t want Louis thinking that was OK. So he’d left, with no more than a blunt ‘I have to go’, and given Louis ten quid more than he’d needed to pay for the drinks, as if to send an even less subtle message.

   **_Louis? I thought you were gonna text me._**

Louis couldn’t stop himself. It was childish, but he was tired and upset and jealous. **_I thought you’d be busy with Niall._**

   About five minutes passed. Then his phone rang. Rolling his eyes to make himself feel better, he picked up. ‘What?’

   ‘What’s wrong?’

   Zayn’s deep, reassuring burr was enough to nearly make him burst into tears. He swallowed hard, but his voice still cracked. ‘Nothing.’

   ‘OK.’ Pause. ‘Look, you have to help me out, Louis. Did Niall say something to you? Because if he did –’

   ‘Something like what?’

   ‘Well…that I’m not your friend anymore? Or that…well yeah, that. I mean, it doesn’t sound like something he’d say but –’

   ‘He hasn’t said anything to me.’

   He could hear relief in Zayn’s exhale, although he couldn’t work out why he’d feel so strongly about it. ‘Alright. So. It’s not Niall.’

   For God’s sake. ‘No Zayn, it’s not Niall.’ Louis wasn’t about to rain on his parade, if he was so smitten with his new best friend. ‘It’s nothing. I’m fine. How are you?’

   ‘I’m good.’ He was smiling, and it was annoying. ‘You know Soylent Green was people? How fucked up is that?’

   Louis wanted to indulge him, but he was too exhausted. He snuggled down in his bed, closing his eyes. ‘Yeah, I knew.’

   ‘You’re falling asleep,’ Zayn noted cheerfully. ‘Should I talk to you tomorrow?’

   ‘Yeah, alright.’ Louis couldn’t bring himself to be mad at him. Or even Harry. He was just tired. ‘Night Zayn.’

   ‘Night mate.’ Louis heard a grunt, then a mumble. ‘Niall says night too.’

   Now they were having fucking sleepovers by themselves?

   Louis hung up, before he could say something he’d regret.

   A sharp _ding_ yanked him out of sleep less than ten minutes later.

   It was a Snapchat and he’d clicked on it before he could even register that it was from Harry.

   The curly-haired boy was in a bathroom, but no bathroom Louis had seen before, and his shoulders were bare and he had a melodramatically confused expression on his face. The caption read _I can never remember where he puts his lube…_

   Louis nearly threw the phone across the room. Instead, he switched his light on and sent back a photo of himself shrugging. _Not my problem._

   In the next one Harry was pouting. _Don’t be mad._

Louis flipped the bird. _I’m not mad._

   Harry raised his eyebrow. _Suuuuuuure._

   Two seconds later he was beaming, holding the small tube aloft. _Found it!_

   Louis turned the light off. _Congratulations._

   Harry sent a close-up of the bite mark Louis had left painfully visible below his collarbone, and the bait: _I’m gonna get punished for this…_

   Louis turned it back on, and despite himself sent a long-suffering expression captioned with _Grimmy?_

   To this, Harry didn’t reply.

   Louis tried to fall back asleep, but the little shit had messed up his REM cycle. There was nothing he could do so he turned the light back on yet again and stumbled out of bed, fumbling around under it until he found _Malik Man & Louis the Brave._

   Normally it was reassurance of his own worth as a human being. Now it also served as proof that Zayn was Louis’s best friend. Louis’s.

   After about forty-five minutes, another _ding!_ interrupted his brooding. Half-expecting it to be a text from Zayn coming back crawling, he glanced at the screen.

   Snapchat from Harry. Automatically, he clicked it.

   He read the word _Ben –_ and then he saw the picture.

   Harry was flushed and mussed, the covers drawn down to his waist, his neck and shoulders a mess of bite marks and bruises. And beside him in the bed, sleeping on his side, was a man who looked about forty, with a week’s worth of stubble and lines on his face. Beside Harry, with his slim teenage torso and baby fat, he looked like his father. Which was probably why a wave of nausea suddenly washed violently over Louis, nearly doubling him over. That and the white gloss around Harry’s mouth.

   Now he did throw his phone across the room. And spent the rest of the night hating himself for being, not just concerned, but jealous.


	7. There's Fire In Friction, And Kerosene In Sweat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Louis gets a D. Zayn is fed up with white boys. Ownership rights to Liam are hotly contested. Harry gets it wrong, then right, then wrong again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm really sorry if this is hard to read or at all triggering. i tried to put all the warnings in the tags but just let me know if i need to add more

Louis had thought at first that Flack had given him a D because Harry had told her they were fucking, but it turned out she must have been in a bad mood the day she’d marked the class’s essays because everyone had done badly, despite the majority of them doing everything she’d asked them to, from Calibri font to technical vocabulary. Which was why Louis was standing outside her office with his paper crumpled in his hand and his jaw set, having made an appointment with her at the end of the lesson to discuss changing his mark.

   It was going to be weird being alone in a room with her, Louis admitted to himself. He was sure she’d smell Harry on him, even though they hadn’t fucked since Harry’s after-sex Snapchat selfie four days ago. They hadn’t discussed it, they just hadn’t fucked. Louis wasn’t even sure whether he wanted to. But he did know that he wanted Harry to want to. He’d been waiting for Harry to ask him over, or make a move, or do _something,_ but they hadn’t even been texting. The last time they’d spoken one-on-one had been the cataclysmic Snapchat session when Louis had left him hanging. And he certainly wasn’t about to throw himself at him. That was what Harry wanted.

   At least, Louis was pretty sure that was what he wanted. Harry hadn’t been meeting his eye much either; not even throwing him those random small smirks he pulled off so well. It was as if they’d never had sex at all; like he’d listened when Louis had rejected him the first time; like it hadn’t even lasted long enough to be over.

   Which was fine. Louis only felt like he was going to fall apart because that’s what happens when someone has intense, dom/sub sex with you a few times and then doesn’t speak to you for nearly a week.

   He’d been standing outside Flack’s door for twenty minutes, he realised when he checked his watch. What the hell was she doing? His lunch break was already half over; if Zayn and Niall could tear themselves from their happy little play-oriented world for five seconds they might even be worried he wasn’t there.

   But he wasn’t fooling himself on that one.

   He was absolutely not jealous of Niall. Not in the slightest.

   Just pissed off with him for stealing his best friend.

   No, he didn’t mean that. He really liked Niall; he was an awesome guy.

   Too awesome. Better than him. Not that had ever been hard.

   Now might be the right time to mention that Louis had a chronic inferiority complex. He was well aware that it didn’t show, since he came across as such an arrogant little shit but in fact it was scary how easy it was for him to get pushed over the edge. One time Zayn had been sick with a fever for three days and hadn’t come to school or contacted him and Louis had gotten so freaked out thinking Zayn’s family had upped sticks and he hadn’t even bothered to send him a text that he had run all the way to his house at two o’clock in the morning and rung his phone until Zayn had stood up, stumbled to his front door like a zombie, taken one look at Louis and then puked his guts up at his feet. Luckily, he had been so delirious at the time that Louis didn’t think he even remembered it.

   Half an hour.

   Thirty-five minutes.

   Louis was just steeling himself up to march straight into Flack’s office and demand she change his grade, if only as a reward for all the time she’d wasted – when Harry Styles sauntered out of her door.

   The second he saw Louis, he grabbed the front of his cardigan and pulled him out of her eyeline, hastily shutting it. ‘What are you doing?’ he hissed. ‘I fucking told you we don’t talk about the other people I’m with; were you trying to fucking _listen?’_

   And those harsh, horrible words were the last straw to Louis’s tired, battered body and all the shit he’d had to put up with that week. He burst into tears. Loud, ugly, messy tears.

   And, fair credit to Harry, he didn’t back away or roll his eyes or even keep yelling. He tucked Louis gently under his arm so he could hide his face in his chest, bore him away to the school bathroom and tucked them both inside a cubicle. He was exhausted and placid and he let Harry arrange him on the lid of the toilet so his legs were apart, and he let him secure his arms behind his head with a ribbon he assumed came from Flack and then he watched Harry suck him off with his thick lips and long eyelashes, forcibly holding Louis’s hips down so he could control how much pleasure he gave him, pinching his thighs whenever he made the slightest noise.

   Louis was still crying when he came but Harry kissed him anyway, for once not prising his mouth open with his tongue to make him accept his own release.

   Looking back, Louis supposes that was his way of saying sorry – that and the fact that the next day Flack grudgingly returned his paper again, the D amended to an A. But at the time he let myself hope it was because he’d wanted to get her taste out of his mouth.

   Because he’d wanted to taste Louis instead.

 

*

‘Are you _kidding_ me?’

   ‘I know mate, I’m fucking pissed too but you know what people are like.’

   ‘Perrie’s not even a _guy.’_

   ‘It’s the implication. That’s what they said, anyway.’

   ‘What’s going on?’ Eleanor piped up, she and the girls having just walked into the room.

   Zayn sighed, burying his face in his hands. ‘You tell them, mate. I’m too depressed.’

   Niall shrugged apologetically. ‘Basically the school don’t want Louis kissing Perrie in the play. Too gay. Not that they said that. But apparently if anyone thought Perrie was actually a boy it wouldn’t be ‘family friendly’.’

   Zayn groaned quietly. Louis just sat cross-legged on the stage, his arms folded across his stomach. It didn’t surprise him that the school were trying to leech away the gay. It was just sad. Stupid and sad.

   Harry was the only one of them who looked cheerful. ‘Just make some sex innuendos. ‘Early bird gets the worm’ and all that. Kissing’s overrated.’

   ‘It’s the _principle,’_ Zayn snapped. ‘There’s nothing wrong with being gay and they shouldn’t act like there is.’

   ‘Yeah, but why bother being pissed about something you can’t change?’

   ‘Are you _kidding_ me?’ Zayn repeated. ‘Next you’ll be telling me you think white people can say the n-word.’

   Harry shrugged. ‘I wouldn’t, but whatever floats your boat.’

   Silence. Again, Louis tried to be surprised but couldn’t quite manage it. It fit in perfectly with the rest of Styles’ privileged, ignorant self.

   But Zayn’s jaw dropped, and he looked away from Harry like he couldn’t even be bothered trying to reason with him. _‘Niall.’_

   ‘Mate,’ Niall admonished. ‘You can’t say shit like that.’

   ‘I can’t speak for the n-word,’ Zayn suddenly declared, ‘but if you or anyone else called me a Muslim slur I would not, and should not be held responsible for my actions. You don’t mess with words that aren’t yours. Got it?’

   Harry smiled sweetly. ‘That’s your opinion.’

   Zayn looked like he was about to say something else – in fact a lot of things – but Niall interrupted with a hand on his shoulder, his voice uncharacteristically stern. ‘Harry, apologise. Now.’

   Harry rolled his eyes. ‘Fine _sorry._ God, so much for freedom of speech.’

   ‘Leave,’ Zayn barked.

   Harry blinked. ‘What?’

   ‘I said leave. You know what, I will.’ He grabbed his sketch book and thrust the script at Niall. ‘You take over. Fucking rich kids,’ he spat before he stormed out of the room.

   ‘Drama queen,’ Harry muttered, as if he seriously expected anyone to agree with him.

   ‘Shut the fuck up,’ Niall told him, shocking him sufficiently enough that Harry did. Niall stood – but then his phone buzzed and he checked it automatically, his eyes scanning the screen. His face softened into a small smile. ‘OK. He’s fine, he just needs to calm down. He’d rather we get on with it for the time being. You’re not off the hook, Harry,’ he warned. ‘We’re gonna have a talk later.’ He clapped once. ‘Right, let’s get to work.’

   Louis went through the rehearsal in a complete daze, wondering why the hell he hadn’t spoken up for Zayn. Was he that wrapped around Harry’s finger – or, more accurately, his dick? He _always_ stuck up for Zayn. He always stuck up against any kind of discrimination or ignorance. When had he become so…small?

  Halfway through the rehearsal, Niall called for a break and Louis texted Zayn instantly, having been working out the exact wording all the way through his scenes. **_Hey mate. I’m really sorry I didn’t say anything. I should have. I’m sorry. Forgive me?_**

He didn’t realise Harry was reading over his shoulder until he snorted right in his ear, and he must have imagined the word Harry murmured that nearly made him jump out of his skin. ‘Bitch.’

   ‘What?’

   ‘Nothing. You coming to my house after this?’

   _What?_ ‘No.’

   ‘Mmm hmm.’

   ‘I said _no,_ Harry.’

   ‘Where have I heard that before?’

   He was right. There was no one Louis was fooling, not even himself. He might as well sink to his knees right here and now for how thoroughly and completely Harry had him on a leash.

 

*

Louis hadn’t known what was going to happen but he certainly hadn’t predicted that Harry would be this…angry.

   ‘You’re such a little bitch, Lou,’ he whispered as he dug his nails in to tear them down Louis’s back. ‘You can’t stand up to me so you grovel to him when my back’s turned?’

   ‘I-I don’t…’ Louis stammered helplessly, but then Harry pressed his face into the pillow (he was on his stomach on Harry’s bed, and he was straddling Louis’s hips).

   ‘Shut up,’ he hissed. ‘Shut the fuck up and do what I say. You’re good at that aren’t you, Lou? Show me how good you are.’

   Louis wanted to say something, but he couldn’t breathe. He tried to struggle but Harry’s massive hand was clamped down on the back of his head like a vice, and his weight wasn’t much but it was more than necessary to stop Louis flipping himself over like a fish.

   ‘But that’s not true, is it Lou?’ Harry whispered, his curls brushing the side of Louis’s face like a kiss, his breath hot and damp. ‘You could move if you want to. But you don’t. You want me to tell you what to do. You love it.’ Half-heartedly, Louis twitched, but then Harry slapped his thigh so hard that he saw stars. ‘Don’t fucking lie to me.’

   So Louis relaxed as much as he could, barely squeaking when Harry sank his teeth into his neck. Harry’s grip let up as he began to grow hard against the back of Louis’s thigh, obviously distracted. Louis was already hard too, gasping for air, but he knew that he would be getting no release before Harry did so he tried his best to ignore it although he rutted unconsciously into the mattress, earning himself another slap.

   He felt Harry’s fingers inside him (thankfully, he had at some point bought his own lube), probing and then scissoring, deliberately avoiding Louis’s prostrate because he knew it drove him nuts to _know_ that that spot of pure bliss was right there and being ignored. But this wasn’t about Louis, he reminded himself, as Harry stretched him. This was about him.

   Or so he thought until something hard and cold replaced Harry’s warm fingers, burning as it pushed mercilessly inside him. ‘W-what are you…?’

   ‘You don’t deserve me tonight, Lou,’ he bit out, rough and mean. ‘You only get what I give you and I only give you what you’ve earned.’

   ‘W-what did I do?’ Louis’s voice broke about six times in that one sentence: he was so gone and so desperate he would have done anything to please Harry, and he couldn’t understand what he’d done wrong; that he hadn’t done a good enough job.

   ‘You’re _mine.’_ Harry pushed him down again, Louis’s gasp stifled once more by his sheets. ‘You stick up for _me._ Not Zayn. You should have apologised to _me.’_

   ‘I’m _sorry!’_ Louis cried, consumed by the thought and feeling of the sterile, loveless toy inside him. He didn’t ask his permission, Louis realised fuzzily. He should have asked his permission. But that thought was lost as Harry pressed against the bundle of nerves that made white light explode in his head.

   He heard the new slick of lube and he dared to hope – but then Harry stopped pushing suddenly, leaving the thing inside Louis as his hands clasped the outside of his thighs, pushing them together.

   Louis just had time to understand what Harry was about to do when he felt the familiar shape of his cock push between them, slippery with lube, the friction almost excruciating. ‘Harry –’

   ‘Shut up,’ he snarled, starting to thrust, slow at first but speeding up quickly, thoughtlessly chasing his pleasure while leaving Louis completely untouched save for his dick between his thighs and his toy in his arse. ‘I’m getting off on you one way or another. You don’t have to like it.’

   _Yes I do,_ a defiant voice in Louis’s head whispered. _This was supposed to be my choice too._

   But he ignored it. Harry was right. He was a bitch. He did want this. He wanted the burn and the choke and the violence and the bruises. He wanted the pain.

   And it didn’t matter that when Harry came, splattering Louis’s thighs and back, he sent him into the shower without even a cursory stab at making him feel good too. It didn’t matter that when Louis came back with wet hair and scalding skin he was stretched out on his duvet, already asleep – or pretending to be. It didn’t matter that Louis woke up in the night freezing because he’d stolen all the covers and he didn’t dare pull them back so he spent the rest of the night wide awake with his teeth chattering.

   It didn’t matter. Louis didn’t matter. Nothing mattered except Harry.

   Even as Louis was chanting this to himself, hallucinating with exhaustion but unable to fall back to sleep, the word _love_ never entered his mind. Maybe he was repressing it without even realising it. Maybe he didn’t yet, not properly. Maybe it did and he ignored it.

   Or maybe he never loved him. Maybe he just hated himself enough to be grateful to Harry for clarifying every awful, hateful, degrading thought Louis had ever had about himself. For proving what he’d always known: that Louis was worse than worthless; only good to be gotten off on; a rag doll with a warm mouth.

 

*

It had been a long, long night.

   They had gone out dancing, the five of them, and that wasn’t anything new but there had been something different about tonight. They’d gotten roaring drunk off of Liam’s supplies before they’d so much as set foot in the club, desperate to wash away the school-stress they couldn’t shake sober, and from then on things had only disintegrated further and further into chaos. Liam had stepped behind the bar, remarkably steady on his feet considering he’d downed just as many vodka shots as the rest of us, and the minute they sat down Harry asked Niall to go and get drinks for the rest of us. They seemed to have made up, so he did, and as the others watched him chat amiably to Liam over the counter as he poured generous measures of clear liquor into fruit juice and Cola, Louis saw Zayn’s fists clench. Gleefully, he pointed it out to Harry. He rolled his eyes – and then slipped his fingers down the back of Louis’s trousers, using the lack of underwear required to wear his skinny jeans to stroke small circles around his hole.

   But Louis was determined to show him, so less than five minutes after Niall returned he sent Zayn off on the exact same errand. Zayn was too smashed to even bother to point out that they’d only just started in on their round, draining his without a second thought before setting off on his quest. He too stuck around a little too long talking to Liam, who actually had to catch him before he fell straight into the glasses on the counter, and this time both Harry and Louis picked up on Niall’s scowl.

   They spent the rest of the night alternately ordering their respective mates to buy alcohol and one-upping each other on the reactions of the one left behind. Naturally, this meant that an hour into the night they were so hammered they could barely speak. Harry grew bolder, removing his fingers momentarily to suck them before starting, experimentally, to prod.

   Neither of them noticed when Niall and Zayn disappeared. By that time Harry was well and truly inside, nudging against Louis’s prostrate with every tiny thrust of his fingers. Louis was rock hard, concealed only by the strobes, and nearly sobbing with how much he wanted to come. So when Harry whispered the command in his ear, he did, without even thinking about it, as if all that had been stopping him was the lack of permission as opposed to the fact that he was in a public place and about to go back to his house with three more of their friends.

   Luckily, none of them had seemed to notice. They all practically passed out on top of each other in the taxi back – and Harry used the opportunity to slide the offending fingers into Louis’s mouth. ‘Suck,’ he said, and once again Louis did.

   So when they got back and he’d deposited the others in the sitting room and pulled Louis into his bedroom by his collar and he started to take his trousers off it seemed inevitable that Louis would go along with that too.

   But he was tired and kind of sore and he wanted to give the bruises and bites from the other day time to heal before Harry inflicted them on him all over again. So he said no.

   Harry hesitated. Then he said ‘OK,’ and they snuggled up under his covers lying on each other’s arms and he kissed Louis a bit and he thought he was trying to change his mind but he held firm so then Harry stopped and they started to talk instead, like they hadn’t done in a long while.

   Conversation quickly turned to their EPQs and Harry asked what had inspired Louis’s – ‘You know, apart from being gay.’

   ‘Good question, I guess. I suppose I was watching Big Bang Theory one day and I’d been holding out for so long for the Big Gay Plot Twist of Raj and Howard finally getting together because come the fuck on, they’re obviously romantically and sexually attracted to each other – and then they announced that Howard and Bernadette were going to get married. And I crumbled a little. It just hurt that they ignored a perfectly good plotline just because Gay Is Bad. And that kind of thing happens a lot, I’ve noticed. I think it’s called queerbaiting. Reels in the queer audience without actually giving us anything that could offend the straights. Genius. And disgusting.’ Louis realised that he was probably getting too worked up, especially when faced with someone who lived by the mantra ‘whatever floats your boat’. He didn’t want to get kicked out of Harry’s bed for being too social justice-y. That’s probably the biggest turn-off in the world even for someone who doesn’t think it’s OK for white people to say the n-word. ‘Umm. Anyway. What about you?’

   Harry smirked coolly. ‘What about me?’

   ‘You know. The single mothers thing. What made it such a big deal for you?’

   He shrugged. ‘Well. If you must know, my Dad walked out on me and my Mum when I was six. She’s got a boyfriend now but she was the only adult in the house for me and my sister until I was about fifteen. And you probably think looking at me she did a shitty job but you should see my sister. University girl, radical feminist, gorgeous, strong…Mum did that all on her own. If I turned out bad it’s cos of my Dad, not her. In fact if he’d stayed I probably would have been worse. Imagine that.’ He grinned. ‘Anyway, she deserves some credit for it. So I just want to explore the prejudices against single mothers – since I’ve seen them first-hand – and tell people to wake the fuck up and let them get on with it with extra benefits thrown in.’ He shuddered. ‘And tell fucking Fathers4Justice where to go for that matter.’

   Louis nodded vigorously. ‘Hell yes. Stupid macho misogynists.’ He paused. ‘I can relate, you know. Not really to the single mother thing, but my Dad left before I was born. Mum re-married when I was about three, then when he left another one came a couple of years later so I’ve always had a father figure…but yeah, dads suck. Step or otherwise.’

   ‘I’m actually…gonna get one soon,’ Harry confided almost shyly. ‘Mum’s getting remarried.’

   ‘Oh.’ Louis kicked himself inwardly. ‘Well, I’m sure he’ll be great. I mean, Max only walked out cos of me so you should be fine.’

   Harry frowned. ‘Because of you?’

   ‘Didn’t like me being gay. Didn’t like that my Mum wasn’t crazy about getting me ‘cured’ so he punched me in the stomach until I threw up, gave me a black eye for good measure, and then he left.’ He forced a smile. ‘But you’re old enough to fight for yourself so like I said, you should be fine.’

   ‘Lou, I’m…I’m really sorry.’

   ‘It’s OK,’ Louis assured him, rolling his eyes to the ceiling to stop himself crying. ‘He was probably hitting her too so I’m pretty bloody glad he fucked off and all. Pretty much the only thing I’ve ever done to protect her.’ He tried to keep his voice light, but it still broke. ‘Just a fucking useless gay kid, me.’

   ‘Lou, don’t.’ Harry found his hand by his hip and squeezed it. ‘You’re not…it’s not…you’re overreacting, OK?’

   ‘But Harry –’

   Harry kissed him, hard. And Louis wanted it to stop there but there’s fire in friction and kerosene in sweat and he was too exhausted to remind Harry that he’d said no so he took the executive decision to lie very still and let him demonstrate just how good he was at conveniently forgetting things he didn’t want to hear.

   He was crying by the time they’d both finished, and remembering that this was basically becoming normal by now made him cry harder, humiliated and aching and sticky with come and sweat.

   ‘Lou?’ Harry murmured, as Louis’s eyes fluttered thankfully shut.

   ‘Mmm?’

   ‘You’re not useless, OK?’

   And that definitely should not have made him feel so goddamn fucking happy.


	8. His Demons Will Destroy You Long Before They Destroy Him

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zayn loves Louis, but it’s not enough. Harry is damaged, and Louis is not alright. Everybody is gorgeous, but especially Zayn. Louis loves Harry, but it’s not enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: having a painful past does not excuse abusing someone. but sometimes it can help explain it, and that's important.

Louis shouldn’t have taken Zayn up on the offer of their weekly swim. They hadn’t actually had it in months now but he’d randomly showed up at Louis’s door on Sunday with a towel and asked if he was up for it and Louis had forgotten about the scratches and purple marks still shining all over his torso and he’d said yes and he didn’t realise until he was half-naked in the cubicles of the changing room that there was no way he could show Zayn what he looked like from the waist up.

   He stuck his head around the door, carefully draped in a towel. Zayn was standing by the mirror, examining his thin frame and biting his lip. ‘Mate?’

   He turned instantly. ‘Yeah?’

   ‘I just realised I…can’t.’

   He folded his arms, one eyebrow quirking. ‘Why not?’

   ‘Because…I just can’t, OK? You go. I’m gonna get changed.’

   ‘Louis, what _is_ it? Why are you wearing your towel? Let me see.’

   ‘Get off me!’

   Zayn pushed him gently aside so he could enter the cubicle, shutting the door behind him and then holding out his hands. ‘Give it to me, Louis.’

   ‘N-no.’ Louis could feel his lip trembling.

   ‘Louis. Please.’

   Louis sighed heavily. Then, hands trembling, he gave Zayn the towel.

   Zayn stared. His eyes burned.

   After what felt like a very long time, Louis said ‘Don’t look at me like that.’

   ‘Like what?’ Zayn asked. He didn’t stop.

   Louis didn’t answer.

   ‘Was it Harry?’ Zayn said eventually.

   ‘Yes.’

   ‘Right. Any preference for how I kill him, or…?’

   ‘Zayn! For Christ’s sake, you don’t have to kill him. We’re both consenting teenagers –’

   ‘You _consented_ to that?’

   ‘Yes,’ Louis replied defiantly, reaching for the towel.

   Zayn held it out of reach. ‘Did he ask?’

   ‘Zayn –’

   ‘Did he _ask?’_ he almost yelled.

   Louis cringed. ‘Don’t.’ _I’m a bitch and I wanted it,_ is what he wanted to say, but he doubted Zayn would have been even halfway to OK with that. ‘He…he knows what I want.’

   ‘For God’s sake Louis that’s fucking BDSM, you need negotiation and _verbal consent_ beforehand! Do you at least have a safeword?’

   ‘How the hell did you get so clued up?’ Louis had never considered Zayn a sexual being in the slightest. He didn’t think he’d ever even watched porn, now suddenly he was a fetish expert?

   ‘That’s not the point.’

   ‘Yes, we have a safeword,’ Louis lied. It had never even crossed his mind. He did, however, resolve to ask Harry about it later.

   Zayn rolled his eyes. ‘I bloody know when you’re lying to me, Louis. Jesus, _look_ at you. What did he even _do?’_

‘I have some _agency_ in this, Zayn,’ Louis told him haughtily. _‘We_ engage in consensual, slightly extremist sex.’

   ‘You mean he makes you his pain sub and you put up with it because you want it to be more than that.’

   Louis felt like Zayn had driven his fist straight into his stomach. A gasp ripped out of his throat.

   ‘I’m sorry,’ Zayn amended. ‘But Louis…’

   ‘Just get out, Zayn,’ Louis ordered.

   ‘Mate –’

   _‘Please._ I’m tired and I want to go home.’

   He wasn’t lying either. But Zayn wasn’t letting him get away with it. Before Louis knew it he had him in a massive hug, two-armed for once, sweeping him up completely in his warmth and his soft, sweet smell. ‘I love you, Louis. I know I’ve been…I know Niall…I know we haven’t been hanging out as much recently but God, I love you, you know that right?’

   Of course Louis knew he did. He’d told him often enough, and he still remembered that gut-wrenching night he’d confessed it properly, twisting his fingers in his lap as the words they’d told each other so many times before got stuck like splinters in his throat. Louis remembered kissing him and how he’d reacted to him, and how much he’d known Zayn had _wanted_ to kiss him. He remembered the comic Zayn had spent days on end drawing, every detail of Louis’s face intact even in graphic form. Of course he loved him.

   But he held himself stiff and unresponsive in Zayn’s arms. He had a new best friend. Louis had Harry. It had worked out fine in the end. He just needed Zayn to let him go so he could go home and cry his eyes out.

   ‘I’m sorry, Louis,’ Zayn whispered. Then he unwound his arms, gave him one last sad look and backed out of the cubicle.

   ‘I’m _fine!’_ Louis yelled after him. ‘I’m fucking _fine,_ OK?’

   But he doubted Zayn believed him because at school the next day when Harry sauntered off for another ‘appointment’ with Flack, he put his headphones in and Niall leant across the table to take Louis’s hands, a serious expression on his face. ‘Louis, you can’t indulge him like this. It only makes him worse.’

   ‘It’s not a big deal,’ Louis protested, trying to pull away. He shot Zayn a death glare for mouthing off about his business, but the other boy was avoiding his eyes.

   Niall held him fast. ‘Yes it is. Maybe not for you, but definitely for him. In case you haven’t noticed, he’s got a problem, originating with Ben, fuelled by Nick and exacerbated by Flack. And believe me, his demons will destroy you long before they destroy him.’

   Louis was going to argue back – but the information Niall’s words overflowed with caught him. By now, despite himself, he really wanted to know what the deal was with Harry’s other partners besides him. ‘What do you mean, originating with Ben?’

   Niall sighed. ‘OK. What I’m about to tell you is 100% confidential. You can’t tell anyone, and you definitely can’t tell him I told you. OK?’

   Louis nodded.

   ‘OK. He met Ben when he was about fifteen, when he did an internship at his Mum’s boyfriend’s law firm. Ben’s the CEO. He gave Harry presents and taught him how to give him sex in return. That’s the extent of their relationship as far as I can tell. Then about a year ago Harry started hanging around the radio station and met Nick, who was all too pleased to take advantage of the tricks Ben had already taught him. And then this year he decided to explore the rest of his sexuality so he flirted with Flack until she gave in. Which didn’t take long. She always had her eye on him.’ His teeth clenched a little around the last part. ‘And I think since he plays submissive to all of them he’s always been looking for someone to take out his dominant side on. I hate to tell you this Louis, I really do, but love’s got nothing to do with it. I doubt if he even can, after all the shit he’s been through. All he can do at this point is take it out on you.’ Pause. ‘I’m really sorry, mate. It’s not on, what he’s doing, and I’m not making excuses. But he’s not strong so unless you tell him no he’s not going to stop.’ Pause. ‘Louis? You alright?’

 

*

Louis was not alright. He was very, very not alright.

   He didn’t want to think about fifteen year old Harry on his knees under his stepdad’s boss’s desk. He didn’t want to think about sixteen year old Harry experimentally cupping a pleasantly surprised Nick Grimshaw’s cock through his skintight trousers because that was how he’d been taught to treat men who were nice to him. He didn’t even want to think about seventeen year old Harry seducing Flack until she tumbled into his arms. He didn’t want to think about any of it but he couldn’t get the uncomfortably explicit images out of his head.

   Going around to Harry’s house and unbuttoning his shirt to find scores of scratch marks embedded into his skin only made it worse.

   ‘What the hell happened to you?’ He’d had marks before, obviously, but never quite this deep. A couple were actually bleeding and Louis pressed his mouth to them automatically as if he could kiss them away.

   Harry knotted his fingers in his hair to hold Louis to him, and he felt the tangles of tension in Harry’s muscles loosen as he sighed almost gutturally, secure in his control again. ‘Never you mind.’

   Louis was not alright. ‘But –’

   Harry crushed his face against his chest so his words could no longer come out coherently. ‘Bite me,’ he commanded.

   Louis didn’t hesitate to do what he said even though it confused him. He hadn’t realised that Harry was into pain. Maybe he just wanted to see how much Louis would do for him.

   He’d have to list a lot of things to find something he’d hesitate even for a second to give him. He was sure that Harry knew it too.

  He was not alright.

   Harry fucked him hard and it hurt and it felt like fireworks and liquor and adrenaline and sugar all at once but after a while it just hurt because Louis could feel the anger and the hurt inside him and it snuffed out all his pleasure like a candle, and then he played with Louis for a while the way he liked to, flicking his nipples and tousling his hair. Nothing extreme. Louis was glad of that. He suspected that even Harry might have had his fill of rough, either dominant or submissive, for one day.

   Then someone phoned him and he sent Louis away without cuddling him and it might have been that that made him feel all shaky and hollow inside for ages afterwards, even by the time he was curled up in bed after a hot meal and a hotter bath. Zayn texted him a couple of times asking if he was alright.

   He was not alright.

   He dreamt that the five of them – him, Harry, Liam, Zayn and Niall – were all in a bed together. He dreamt that Harry slipped out of the sheets and tried to tug him out with him and Zayn stirred and asked what was going on and Harry said _We’re just going to do something_ and Zayn just nodded and then went back to sleep and Louis tried to pull away but maybe he didn’t, he couldn’t tell because part of him wanted Harry to drag him wherever he wanted, to the moon and back if it took his fancy, and do whatever he needed to make himself feel better whether it was cut Louis to ribbons on the points of the stars or throw him straight out of the sky. But part of him said _No_ and that was the part of him that was speaking out loud. And then he said _Zayn_ but he was asleep and Niall was curled around him and Liam was halfway to falling off the bed and Harry was pulling and he was starting to give in…

   He woke up. He cried again, because he was basically slowly metamorphosing into a pathetic salty puddle, and then he jerked off.

   Later in the morning, Harry texted him with a link to an audio post. **_Grimmy got cheeky ;)_** he warned, and when Louis listened to it he saw what he meant. Ten minutes into the radio show, Grimshaw had exclaimed _‘Ugh, three of my nails are broken’_ and then, when prompted by his quirky female co-host, grinned _‘Yep, guess you could say I got lucky’._

   Louis was so far from alright at this point that he could have jumped out of the window. **_Please don’t talk to me about Nick Grimshaw._**

   Twenty minutes passed. **_Why not? He’s hilarious._**

**_He’s an arsehole._ ** _Who took advantage of you being molested and groomed to turn you into his sex toy, you stupid twat._

Twenty five minutes. **_Don’t be a dick, Lou. You’re no fun when you’re grumpy._**

**_Fuck off._ **

   No answer. Louis pulled the covers over his head and stayed awake with his eyes shut until his mum called for him to help her with the housework. That was when he pulled on his clothes and snuck out of the front door.

 

*

Maybe, Louis thought, he was overreacting. It wasn’t that bad, really. He could handle this, so long as it didn’t get any more weird.

   But his heart really did literally leap right into his mouth, along with his stomach, when Flack handed Harry his essay back in class, and he gave her a smile through slightly hooded eyes and said ‘Thanks Mummy.’

   There was a beat of silence. Then the class exploded into hoots of laughter.

   Not Louis, though. His leg had jerked so hard in shock that he’d whacked his knee on the underside of his desk. He felt like all the breath had been knocked out of his body.

   ‘Enough!’ Flack snapped, two spots of colour appearing on her cheeks like paint.

   ‘Sorry Miss,’ Harry muttered, not quite as red as her but flushed all the same.

   She ignored him, thrusting Louis’s papers at him before striding back to her desk, shoulders stiff and head held high. She began to tell the students about Situation Ethics – but ten minutes in she was clearly having trouble holding herself together and Louis saw the hard look she shot at Harry just before he put his hand up and asked if he could go and get a drink of water. She gave him permission, and he’d barely left the room before she was announcing that she had to go and pick up some textbooks for her next class.

   He returned first. He looked completely dehydrated, and Louis saw his wince as he sat down next to him.

   She returned second. She had no textbooks, and her palms were pink.

   ‘I bet you think I’m kidding.’

   Zayn did. _‘What?’_

But Niall nodded knowingly. ‘Yeah, I forgot about that. He sort of has an Oedipus complex.’

   ‘A _what?’_ Zayn repeated – not, Louis knew, because he didn’t know what it was, but because he did.

   And Louis knew too. Which was why he also said ‘A _what?’_

   Niall smiled pityingly. ‘Something to do with trying to single-handedly take care of his mother since he was ten. Not in, like, a weird way, not really. But it’s not a coincidence that he only took up with Flack after Anne got engaged.’

   Zayn’s face, at any other time, would have been absolutely priceless. Louis really had to check up on him in case he was in shock. ‘You OK mate?’

   He shrugged. ‘Depends. Are you?’

   ‘Mmm.’

   Niall sighed. ‘I guess you’re in this for the long haul, aren’t ya?’

   ‘I guess,’ Louis murmured. ‘I don’t know. I just…like him. And I have no fucking idea why.’

   ‘Me neither,’ Zayn chimed in helpfully.

   Niall rolled his eyes fondly at him, and then touched Louis’s arm. ‘I get it. I told you he gets under your fingernails. You just have to…keep your distance. Emotionally, I mean.’

   Louis nearly laughed at how long ago that ship had sailed. ‘Mmm.’ He shook his head, shuddering. ‘God, sorry. It’s just. _Mummy.’_

   Niall smirked. ‘Mmm. I know it’s a little weird. But we shouldn’t judge kinks, even if they are the product of psychological disorders.’

   ‘Oh God,’ Zayn groaned. ‘Don’t get him started’.

   ‘Feedism’s actually a great example of that –’

   ‘Oh God,’ Zayn groaned. ‘You got him started.’

   ‘Cos it’s, like, quite possibly triggered by childhood neglect or the negative emotions behind comfort eating, but as long as it’s not harming anyone then why should there be a problem?’

   ‘Because it makes you _fat,’_ Zayn murmured, his distaste evident.

   Niall shrugged cheerfully. ‘In regulation it doesn’t have to. Anyway, fat’s an arbitrary concept when it comes to attractiveness and pretty damn near it in terms of health. As long as you’re not morbidly obese there’s no reason why you shouldn’t live a long and healthy life, any more than if you’re thin.’

   Zayn didn’t reply. He was biting his lip a little too hard. Louis wondered if Niall knew yet about his history with his weight.

   But from the tone of his voice they’d had this conversation many times, and from what Louis knew of them they didn’t have many secrets. He decided to assume that they had, and trust Niall to know what was best for him.

   Sure enough, Niall put his arm around Zayn and he instantly seemed to relax. The blond boy’s next words were slightly more careful. ‘Look, weight doesn’t matter, full stop. Megan Fox is gorgeous. So is Adele. So is everybody.’ He glanced at Zayn. ‘Though I have to say, mate, you’ve got the edge on most of us.’

   Louis’s best friend blushed a fiery red. But he was smiling a little.

   ‘He’s right,’ Louis chipped in. But he didn’t think Zayn heard him. His smile was still growing. So was Niall’s. They were staring at each other.

   What the fuck was in the water today?

 

*

Whatever it was, Louis wanted some. Being high might have made what Harry had planned for him that night more bearable.

   ‘Ben edges me all the time,’ he’d assured him as he’d tied Louis’s wrists to either end of his bedpost – rope this time – and given his ribs a quick jab just to demonstrate that he had no method of stopping Harry from doing whatever he wanted, no matter how much he squirmed. ‘It’s fun. I just want to try it from the other end.’

   ‘Harry,’ Louis whispered, and miraculously he stopped and looked Louis in the eyes, long enough for him to croak ‘Don’t hurt me.’

   Harry rolled his eyes. ‘Don’t be such a baby. It doesn’t hurt. You’ll like it. OK?’

   He didn’t wait for Louis to reply. Probably because he could sense that he was about to back out – if, for that matter, he’d ever been ‘in’.

   But he knew exactly how to make him bend. And it involved his fingers, Louis’s nipples, and a short sharp twist.

   Louis yelped like a kicked puppy, his back arching almost to a point.

   He always wished Harry would be more worried when he made it clear that he was in pain. Even just a flash of remorse, or a quick check on his wellbeing. But the most acknowledgement he ever made of his discomfort was a smirk, or a low chuckle. He liked it. Maybe he just assumed that Louis liked it too. Or maybe he didn’t care.

   Louis knew which one was more plausible. But he didn’t want to admit it to myself. He was still trying to see the good in him.

   And even now, it’s still possible for him to. With all the fucked up stuff Harry had been through in his life, of course he had a strange approach to sex. It would have been fine, if it just hadn’t hurt so much.

   That night, Harry pushed, cajoled, sucked and stroked Louis to the edge four times, gripping him at the base – or pouring a glass of cold water on his chest – to pull him back, like when kids on school trips used to grab your arm, make to push you into the road and then yank you away while screaming _Saved your life!_

   Except he was killing him.

   Not that that was anything new.

   By the time he finally let Louis come he barely felt it, except for a numb sense of finally being free. If he had been flying before, it had been with a chain around his neck. Now it had snapped and there was nothing to stop him going all the way up; past the sky and right up into space…

   ‘Tomlinson. Oi, Tomlinson.’

   Harry was very far away. Louis couldn’t see him either, only a blur of velvety glinting green and hard bright white.

   ‘For fuck’s sake, Lou, I need you to stop lying there like a fucking dead weight and get dressed. My Mum’ll be home soon. _Lou!’_

   Louis wanted to make him happy but his body was like a slab of lead and his tongue was like a heavier slab of lead and he couldn’t even conjure up coherent similes anymore. He just wanted to swim in the green and white forever.

   ‘For crying out fucking loud,’ Harry muttered, more to himself, and then the green and white and warmth of his body went away for a long time leaving Louis to float in nothing at all.

   By the time Harry scooped him up in his arms, Louis’s eyes were closed completely and the light that hit their outsides as he carried him into a different room did nothing to prompt him to open them even if he had any control at all over his body at that point.

   He didn’t even do anything when Harry all but dropped him into a bath half-full of cold water. He sort of wanted to scream but his vocal chords were lax and his jaw was slack. He was, metaphorically, literally, and everything in between, completely fucked.

   His body must have spasmed though, because Harry sighed in something like relief. ‘OK, so you’re not dead.’

   He sighed again, and Louis sensed him kneel down by the bathtub, and then he felt his fingers sweep absentmindedly across his chest. He must have reacted in some way to that too because he heard a grin in Harry’s voice. ‘God, I love how sensitive you are. It’s so fun.’

   Louis could hear him a little clearer now. The cold was starting to creep into his bones, which he took as a positive. He still had bones, at least.

   ‘You are OK, right Lou? I know I go kind of far and I’m sort of a sociopath. But you are OK, right?’

   Luckily, the end of that sentence happened to coincide with Louis’s voice coming back. ‘Yeah, I’m fine.’

   He couldn’t describe how much he didn’t want Harry to believe him.

   But he did. ‘Cool. Er, sorry about the cold water. I’ll get it a bit warmer, yeah? And I have oils…bubbles…scents…no gay jokes please…here, this is my Mum’s best stuff and she swears by it for stress relief. And I guess you’re not exactly stressed but you know, it’s good stuff. It’s from Selfridges.’

   ‘Posh twat,’ Louis croaked.

   Pause, and then he roared with laughter. _‘Definitely_ not dead, then. OK, the water’s rising a bit now so you might want to sit up…come on, I’ve got you. There you go. Hey! Alright, fine, I’ll hold on. Oh God, your hair…here, I’ll wash it. God you look good with it off your face. Like Audrey Hepburn or something. Right, not that you don’t smell good normally but you’re gonna smell of vanilla today. Well, tomorrow. Actually, I think it’s already tomorrow. Yep. Five past twelve. You lost me a fair few hours, mate. I don’t mind though. You can sleep here tonight if you want. Obviously, I guess. Not that I was gonna kick you out into the street.’ Pause. ‘I think I’m gonna stop talking now.’

   _Don’t,_ Louis wanted to say, but his words had gone again.

   Which may or may not have been due to Harry’s fingers in his mouth (it was nice. Sucking was soothing).

   Either way, they spent the rest of the night in silence.

   Louis woke up at about four in the morning, went into the bathroom, and cried until he fell asleep crumpled on the tiled floor in a sad, sweet-smelling heap.


	9. Unravel Me To Screw Me Up Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Louis makes Harry uncomfortable. Zayn makes Louis kiss girls. Harry makes Louis his. Louis makes Zayn cry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you so so much to the people who left lovely comments! you have no idea how happy it makes me, i love you all and i hope you like the next bit x
> 
> (minor self-harm trigger warning)

It had been three months since the first time Harry and Louis had had sex. A couple of days before, Louis had half-heartedly mumbled something about anniversaries and Harry had seemed fairly enthusiastic about the idea, giving him a cheerful high-five. But on the day he’d been busy with Ben and so Louis was given a consolation prize of a week later, and now they were lying in Harry’s bed tangled up together and Louis had had just about enough of not telling him how he felt because how he felt was like he was two seconds away from falling apart. ‘Harry.’

   ‘Mmm?’

   He shifted, pulling Louis microscopically closer as if he could sense what he was about to tell him he wanted and was trying to compromise: an inch less physical space between us and a mile more mentally. Fucking coward. ‘We need to talk.’

   ‘Do we?’

   ‘Yes.’

   He hesitated, and Louis heard the whir of his brain as he tried to wriggle his way out of his priorities. ‘Umm…OK. Fine.’

   ‘OK.’ And now Louis didn’t have a clue what he’d been going to say, even though he’d spent hours last night planning it out, even drawing up a bloody spider diagram to arrange his thoughts when he should have been doing his History homework. Funny how he’d never been motivated to do the same thing toward his actual education before. ‘OK. Look. I just…I feel like we never talked this through. One minute it was banter and the next you were taking my trousers off. And I’m not saying I didn’t _want_ that, you know, necessarily, it’s just that I always pictured my first time would be with someone I…well, who I…knew a bit better. And I still feel like I don’t know you at all. And what I do know of you says you’re a fundamentally good person who’s a bit messed up and anything else I found out about you probably wouldn’t do much to change that basic image but I still do. Want to know. Because. I like you. And I want to know that there’s an opportunity that one day we could be more than…than whatever we are now. Because what we are now kind of hurts. Not anywhere in particular. Just. In a general sort of way. And I’ve been hurting for a while now and I just want you to…I don’t know. Say something. Anything.’ Pause. ‘Harry?’

   ‘Oh. I wasn’t sure if you were finished.’

   ‘I’m not. I think. I guess it depends what your answer is.’

   ‘My answer to what?’

   ‘Are you serious?’

   ‘Don’t talk to me like that. I’m not fucking _stupid,_ Lou, you’re just not making much sense. What exactly do you want from me?’

   ‘I don’t _know,_ that’s what I’m trying to figure it out –’

   ‘Well maybe you should wait until you’ve figured it out to bring it up with me because I’ve actually got enough on my plate at the moment without you –’

   ‘Without me what? You started this –’

   ‘Oh don’t pull that on me, you wanted this just as much as me if not more –’

   ‘Harry, please.’ Louis couldn’t stop a sob. ‘Why do you want to do this to me; how can you _like_ this –’

   ‘What? Pain? Polygamy? Sex?’

   ‘This…this _hollowness._ Why can’t we ever have something meaningful? Why don’t you look after me afterwards? You’re supposed to; Zayn says –’

   ‘Now you’re fucking talking to Zayn about it?’

   ‘No!’ Louis had simply asked his friend’s advice on responsible BDSM a couple of times. It was probably Niall’s doing but he really seemed a hell of a lot more clued up on it than Louis was. And his insistence on regulations and rules and safety were starting to scare him a little because they were precautions that he and Harry never, ever took. And it seemed that Louis was the one being left to deal with the fallout. ‘It’s just…Harry, we don’t even have a safeword –’

   ‘I told you, they’re boring. What’s the fun if it can’t go wrong?’

   ‘Can you _hear_ yourself, Harry? What if I got really hurt –’

   ‘You _won’t._ Jesus Christ, why does it always have to be about you? I know what I’m doing, I’ve had it done to me since I was fucking fifteen, I know what’s safe and I know when to stop.’

   ‘No you don’t because you _like_ it, Harry, we have different thresholds and you can’t expect me to just deal with whatever you throw at me like I’m some kind of…of sex doll in your fucking drawer. You can’t. It’s not –’

   ‘What? _Fair?’_

   ‘Yes,’ Louis whispered.

   ‘Well tough. Life’s not fair. And you can walk out anytime you want. You chose this, as much as me. Don’t fucking forget that, Lou.’ Then he was straddling him, his hand pressing down on Louis’s mouth. ‘Simple question, simple answer. You want to walk out, shake your head. I’ll let you go; hell I’ll pay for your taxi home. We can be friends, and we can pretend that none of this ever happened. You want to stay and have some fun and still be friends, nod. Your choice. Go.’

   Louis stared up at him. Harry stared down back.

   He was stronger than Louis, and angrier, and far more aggressive when he wanted to be, but Louis knew he’d let him go the second he indicated that he wanted him to. He’d probably be friendly about it. He probably would act like it never happened.

   And that, more than anything, would break Louis beyond all possible repair. He couldn’t even imagine what would happen if he let Harry to do that to him. It would crush him. It would wreck him. He’d end up walking – or running – right into a road.

   Blue on green. Gaze unbroken, Louis nodded.

   ‘That’s my good boy,’ Harry murmured roughly.

   And so Louis was his good boy and Harry was his master until he came undone and it basically all seemed like a pretty good metaphor for something or other, really.

   But then, Louis was always a hopeless romantic.

   In his defence, he was only seventeen.

 

*

‘Louis,’ his therapist says softly. ‘You’re still seventeen.’

   He shakes his head, looking away. ‘What do you want me to say? I don’t know what to say.’

   ‘What do _you_ want to say?’

   ‘I don’t want to say anything,’ he snaps, and then the words are flowing out of him faster than he can control, can catch, can take back or filter or regret. ‘I don’t want to tell you that we went to the club again and we danced when Liam was at the bar and Niall and Zayn had disappeared again and he pressed our chests together and stuck his leg between my thighs and I ground him until I came right there letting him unravel me to screw me up again and that afterwards he took me to the bathroom and shut us in a cubicle and fucked me with his hand over my mouth and that afterwards he took me back to our usual booth and tipped half a bottle of vodka down my throat to calm me down and when Zayn and Niall came back their eyes were bright and their faces were flushed and Zayn took me home because he was worried about me but he whispered to me in bed that night that Liam had given them coke _and it was amazing, Louis, Jesus it’s like sunshine and lightning and snow all at once_ and that I woke up in the night like I always do now and he was on the phone to someone and he was saying the things that Harry said to me sometimes when he was in the mood to make me feel wanted and I didn’t do anything I just went back to sleep and I snuck out early the next morning and sat on the road for a little while like a homeless kid kicked out of his house for being gay and that I went home and unscrewed the blade of a sharpener and dragged it across the top of my thigh until a small pale patch of skin looked like the intersection of a motorway after a war.’ He stops abruptly and takes a deep, dizzying breath, his eyes aching. ‘I don’t know what to say.’

   Her eyes look a little damp too. Without a word she stands, walks over, and dumps the dog on his lap. ‘Here. Cuddle with him for a little while, sometimes he knows what to do better than me.’

   Louis smiles reluctantly. ‘Aren’t you the one getting paid for this session?’

   She smiles softly back. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll buy him a special treat.’

   Louis pets the dog absentmindedly for a little while. His fur is marshmallow-soft, and underneath it his little body is warm and throbbing with his heartbeat.

   It reminds him of Harry.

   He almost starts properly crying.

   ‘Do you want to stop?’ the therapist asks.

   But he shakes his head. He needs to get this out. Before it poisons him. ‘I’ll keep going. It’s nearly over anyway.’

   ‘OK,’ she says, and he breathes in once more, tangling his fingers in the dog’s fur, before continuing.

 

*

_‘How oft when thou, my music, music play’st,_

_Upon that blessed wood whose motion sounds_

_With thy sweet fingers when thou gently sway’st_

_The wiry concord that mine ear confounds,_

_Do I envy those jacks that nimble leap,_

_To kiss the tender inward of thy hand,_

_Whilst my poor lips which should that harvest reap,_

_At the wood’s boldness by thee blushing stand!_

_To be so tickled, they would change their state_

_And situation with those dancing chips,_

_O’er whom they fingers walk with gentle gait,_

_Making dead wood more bless’d than living lips._

_Since saucy jacks so happy are in this,_

_Give them thy finger, me thy lips to kiss.’_

   ‘Zayn, I get it.’

   ‘Then make me believe it.’

   Their increasingly-fanatical director had been reciting sonnets at Eleanor and Louis for over half an hour now, trying to get them in the mood for their love scene. It didn’t take a genius to tell that Louis was distracted, but it didn’t help that Zayn _was_ a genius who was proving to know the entirety of the Bard’s sonnets by heart.

   Harry was smirking at Louis. Niall looked worried. Zayn seemed to be regretting his sharpness. ‘Sorry mate. We can stop if you want.’

   Harry snorted, and muttered something that sounded very much like _‘Scared of a girl’._

   Louis snapped. He grabbed Eleanor by the waist, bent her backwards and crushed his mouth against hers. His eyes were wide open, but Louis saw hers flutter shut as she succumbed, her lips parting to allow him access.

   Naturally, he took her up on her offer and they full-on snogged for nearly two whole minutes before Zayn cleared his throat very loudly and said ‘Louis? I think you got the idea. Maybe we could go back to the script now?’

   Shaking a little, Louis let his co-star up. She was flushed, and he realised with a jolt that her lipstick was smeared, meaning some of it must be on his mouth too.

   ‘That was amazing,’ she breathed.

   ‘It’s called acting,’ Louis retorted, far more harshly than he should have.

   ‘Hey,’ Perrie snapped, clearly not best pleased at his unsolicited advances on her friend. ‘Don’t be a dick. El, you have my absolute blessing to slap him right now.’

 But she just kept smiling at him stupidly, biting her lip.

   Zayn and Niall looked gobsmacked.

   But Harry was a different story. Throughout the rest of the rehearsal Louis thought for sure that he was going to explode.

   ‘Mine,’ he growled, hours later, pushing Louis against the wall so hard that his head smacked against the stone. ‘Fucking _mine,_ you understand?’

   Louis didn’t bother to point out the blatant hypocrisy of his statement because he was a little bit scared. ‘I told you, I was just acting –’

   ‘I know you were acting you little bitch, as if you could enjoy kissing a girl. That doesn’t mean you can fucking do it.’ Harry shook him hard. ‘Tell me you understand.’

   ‘I _do,_ goddamnit, let me go you’re hurting me.’

   ‘Good. Don’t you get it, you stupid slut? That’s the point. It’s supposed to hurt.’

   _Not if I don’t want it to._

   Louis thought it but he didn’t say it, and he stopped thinking it soon enough anyway.

   His phone buzzed in the front pocket of his jeans as Harry rutted up ceaselessly against him and the friction must have pressed the wrong button because the next thing he knew, Zayn’s voice was burring, muffled, against his thigh. _Louis? Are you there? What’s going on?_

   Louis tried to break free of Harry’s grip to get to his phone, but he held him tight. ‘Since him, the entire world and its fucking mother know we’re doing this,’ he muttered in Louis’s ear, ‘let’s give him a show, huh?’

   _Louis? Are you OK?_

   Once more Harry slammed him against the wall and he couldn’t stop a cry.

   _Louis, Jesus, talk to me!_

   Louis whimpered as Harry tore his shirt open and raked his nails down his chest.

   _Louis I can_ hear _you, what’s going on? Are you hurt?_

Louis yelped as Harry bit into his neck, harder than he ever had.

   He grunted as Harry pushed him to his knees.

   He choked as he forced his cock down his throat.

   Zayn was frantic by this point. _Speak to me. Louis? I swear to god, I’m calling the police in five minutes –’_

   Louis couldn’t see him but he assumed Harry rolled his eyes as he bent down, snatched the phone from Louis’s pocket and pressed it to his ear. ‘Zayn? Hi mate, it’s Harry. Listen, in case you couldn’t tell we’re kind of busy right now so why don’t you call him back later. OK? Cool. Bye.’

   Louis heard _Styles I’m gonna fucking decapitate you_ before he hung up.

 

*

Zayn was waiting for Louis when he got home, Harry having left him to go to Grimshaw, drinking tea with Louis’s mother who must have left early from work for once (since she’d found her second job she was normally gone by the time Louis woke up and back long after he’d gone to bed).

   It was such a familiar, homely, safe scene that it brought tears to Louis’s already crimson eyes. Unwilling to start a scene in front of his mum, he just took a seat opposite Zayn, and the cup she offered. ‘How come you’re here?’

  ‘Checking on you,’ Zayn said evenly, though Louis noted dully that his left fist was clenched into a tight lump of stone. ‘You sounded a bit off on the phone.’ He gave Louis a pointed once over. ‘Clearly I’m not needed.’

   Louis went red, knowing he looked a total mess with his crumpled clothes and tousled hair. Zayn didn’t need to rub it in.

   ‘You are OK, aren’t you baby?’ his mum asked, taking his hand. ‘How’s school? I already asked Zayn, not that I needed to.’

   Zayn smiled thinly, not taking his eyes off of Louis. ‘Just doing my best.’

   ‘School’s fine,’ Louis replied flatly. ‘You’ve seen my grades.’

   She squeezed his fingers. ‘I know. I’m so proud of you, darling.’

   Louis squeezed back, although her tight hold reminded him a little too much of Harry. This was what it was all supposed to be for, he reminded himself for the first time in months. Taking care of her.

   Zayn surveyed them, his smile becoming a little less forced. ‘You look so like each other.’

   ‘I know, I’m gorgeous,’ Louis joked.

   ‘You are,’ his mum murmured, giving his temple a kiss. ‘Well, I should go to bed. Stay as long as you want, Zayn, you boys know where everything is.’ She gave him a hug, and Louis another kiss. ‘Stay out of trouble.’

   They bid her goodnight and sat at Louis’s cramped kitchen table a little while longer, toying with their teaspoons and absently eavesdropping on the rustle of material and hiss of the water pipes: the symphony of Mother Going To Bed in E minor.

   When the music had faded and all they could hear was silence and the occasional soft snore, Zayn pushed his cup away. ‘That didn’t sound consenting to me.’

   ‘It was rough,’ Louis muttered. ‘It’s fine.’

   ‘Rough for you.’

   ‘Yes. He likes it like that.’

   ‘But what do _you_ like, Louis? Tell me rough, loveless hatefucks are all you want out of a relationship and I’ll stop nagging you. Go on.’ His eyes suddenly looked glossy, and damp. ‘I want you to tell me that, Louis. I just want you to be happy.’

   Zayn staring sadly at him like a compassionate Greek God was too much for Louis to take. Something snapped inside him and he burst into tears.

   There was no pain with him. Louis had never noticed it before because he’d never had a reason to but now all he could really focus on was the fact that when Zayn held him it was just soft and warm and smelt of leather. Nothing sharp. Nothing blunt. Nothing hateful.

   He must have said as much without realising it because Zayn let out a sigh that was half-exasperation and half-hurt, grasped his chin and kissed him like the world was about to end, his tongue softly probing, his lips insistent and yielding at once.

   Yes. This, Louis could handle. This he could understand.

   But then Zayn was pulling away, wiping his mouth, shaking his head. ‘Sorry. I. Sorry. Force of habit, I think. We should talk.’

   But Louis didn’t want to talk. He pulled Zayn into him by the collar, his mouth open and his eyes closed, like Harry liked him; the only way anyone would want him.

   ‘Louis,’ Zayn murmured, the words dripping like honey onto Louis’s tongue. ‘You have to stop.’

   ‘Why?’ Louis breathed. He was so sore and so tired but he wanted to make him happy and to prove to him that he was alright and even if Zayn was with Liam he didn’t have to tell anyone, and Louis had certainly learnt to keep his mouth shut. Who had he been to ever say no to him? What right did he have to deny anyone anything they wanted from him?

   ‘Love, I’m serious. Look at you, you’re exhausted. Come on sweetheart, let’s get you to bed.’

   Oh God. Pet names. He only used those when he was seriously concerned about Louis’s mental health. The last time had been when Stan had rejected him. The time before that was when his stepdad fucked off.

   ‘I’m fine,’ Louis told him as Zayn escorted him to his bedroom like he was suddenly much more breakable. ‘I’m fine.’

   ‘No you’re not,’ Zayn said bluntly. ‘I love you but you’re a fucking mess right now and you need to know that or you’re never going to be able to get better. You. Are. Not. Fine.’

   ‘I’m _fine,’_ Louis insisted, although he barely knew what the word meant anymore. ‘You’re the one who did coke.’

   Zayn went red. ‘One time. Fucking Liam’s a full on pusher, did you know that? Wait, let me guess; Styles forgot to mention it.’

   ‘Really?’

   ‘Yep. One of those rich kid drug dealers. His Dad’s a music producer, his clients give it to him and Liam nicks it.’

   ‘How’s it going with you and Liam then?’

   He groaned. ‘Could you please forget about me and Liam? There are more important things to worry about right now. He unzipped Louis’s jacket, and his jaw dropped at the sight of his torn shirt and bloodied chest. ‘Case in fucking point. What the hell?’

   Quickly, Louis calculated the best move for him right now and hit upon the perfect solution.

   He went limp in Zayn’s arms and pretended to be asleep.

   ‘God,’ he murmured, so Louis could barely hear him. ‘What am I going to do with you, love?’

   His phone rang as he lay Louis down on his mattress and Louis heard the cuffs of his jacket clink against his zip as he brought it out to answer it. ‘Hey. Oh, hi babe. Sorry I had to take off. Yeah, he’s…well, no, he’s not.’ His voice was thickening. ‘I can’t even…he looks like he got hit by a goddamn train. You’re gonna have to talk to Harry again. If I see him within the next three days I really am going to fuck him up. Yeah. That’s a good idea, actually. I’ll miss you though. Yeah. Mmm. Of course I’m OK, I’m not the one who…OK. I know. I’m calm. Yes I’m breathing, listen. Satisfied? Look, I should probably go if that’s alright. I just need to focus on him tonight. Of course. I know. Yeah. Yeah. I love you, babe. Sleep well. Night.’

   ‘Who was that?’ Louis managed to ask, his lips barely finding the strength to part.

   Zayn jumped. ‘Didn’t realise you were still awake. No one important. Go to sleep, yeah?’

   ‘Stay.’ Pause, while Louis tried to find the words. ‘Harry never stays.’

   Louis swore his voice broke. ‘Oh my God, Louis.’

   So, out of sympathy, Louis supposed, Zayn stayed and played big spoon all night.

   Louis is pretty sure that neither of them slept a wink.


	10. Fucking Hell Balls

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Louis gets various pieces of good advice. He listens. Harry has phone sex. He doesn’t like it. The sky isn’t blue but Louis still says no. Also, Liam does not beat Zayn up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm hoping this will be a slightly more satisfying chapter...let me know if you like it :) x

‘And that’s it,’ Louis says, his voice dull and spent. ‘He told me to see a therapist, so I did.’

   ‘That must have all been very hard for you to tell me,’ the therapist says (you guessed it) softly.

   To be honest, it’s starting to irk Louis a little bit. Why isn’t she angry with him? Why isn’t she calling him out for being so stupid? Why isn’t she taking her damn dog away before he infects it and all? ‘Why does that matter?’

   ‘Why wouldn’t it matter?’ she asks. ‘This session is about you. What were you hoping to get out of it?’

   But he has no idea. He just looks at her silently for a little while, until she sighs and checks her watch. ‘Well, we’re nearly out of time, but would you like me to tell you what I think?’

   He nods eagerly. Maybe now she’ll yell at him.

   But she just smiles sadly. ‘I think that this Harry has a very skewed perspective on sex and he took it out unfairly and violently on you. But I also think that your self-esteem issues played a big part in you not saying no. And I think that that’s definitely something you need to work on.’

   Pause. She doesn’t say anything else, so Louis ventures a question. ‘And then what?’

   She frowns slightly. ‘What do you mean?’

   Why does she keep bloody saying that; is she paid by the vague inquiry? ‘What do I do about Harry?’

   ‘Harry doesn’t matter,’ she says calmly. ‘What matters is you. When you feel better in yourself, you can start thinking about the best way to deal with him. Until then, I’d say keep him at a distance. And Louis?’

   ‘Yeah?’

   ‘Practise saying no. OK?’

   And he has to admit, that makes a little bit of sense. ‘OK.’

   She smiles. Softly. ‘Wonderful. I’m afraid we’re out of time, but I’ll see you next week. Remember what I said.’

   He nods. ‘Thank you.’

   As soon as he’s out of the office, he turns his phone back on.

   There’s a message from Niall, a message from Zayn, and, of course, a message from Harry. They read, respectively

   **_Louis Zayn told me what happened I WILL MAKE THIS UP TO YOU S2G HARRY IS GETTING SUCH A BOLLOCKING HOPE YOU’RE OK M8 xxxxx_**

**_How was therapy? Are you OK? I’m with Niall, where should we meet you? xxx_ **

**_Where have you been, sweetcheeks? x_ **

   Automatically, Louis types out a response to Harry first. **_Sick. Probably your fault ;)_**

Then he stares at it for a second, and deletes it. A fucking winky face? What is he turning into?

   He replies to Zayn instead, and the three of them end up hanging out at Niall’s house watching _Fight Club_ (when Zayn finds out who Tyler Durden really is he looks so shocked that it makes Louis laugh for what feels like the first time in ages. ‘But…’he keeps saying after, his eyes wide, ‘but _how?’_ Louis can see why Niall enjoys showing his friend old movies).

   But when the TV is switched off, Niall turns to face Louis with a serious look. ‘Listen mate, I’m really sorry. Harry, he’s…I mean, he’s messed up, I don’t know a nice way to say it. You know, it’s partly why I chose to research BDSM for my EPQ. He’s never bothered, and I really think it’s the kind of thing you need to look into before you start practising it.’ His eyes flicker with something like anger. ‘Not that he ever really had a choice.’

   Zayn nudges him. ‘That doesn’t mean he shouldn’t have given Louis one.’

   ‘Of course,’ Niall says hastily. ‘I just meant, I’m gonna have a proper talk with him as soon as I’m clued up. But in the meantime, honestly Louis, trust me on this one and stay away from him.’

   ‘I can’t just leave him,’ Louis protests.

   ‘He fucking leaves you,’ Zayn grits out.

   Niall nudges him back. ‘Look. Let’s just keep it us four for a while. No leaving Louis alone with him.’ He looks at Louis. ‘And no leaving Harry alone, period. OK?’

   Zayn nods. So does Louis. It’s a compromise, but it’s not a bad one. And to be honest, the best thing Louis can think of for every single one of them right now is numbers.

 

*

‘Harry?’

 ‘Yes Zayn?’

   ‘With all due respect, get your fucking hands off of Louis before I kick your head in.’

   ‘I didn’t touch him!’

   ‘Yes you did,’ Louis points out. He can already feel the bruise forming from the pinch.

   Harry glares at him, but backs off, holding his hands up exaggeratedly. ‘Just trying to make this bloody play a little less boring.’

   ‘Fuck off, ya spoilt dickhead,’ Perrie says cheerfully. ‘Ignore him Zayn, he doesn’t respond well to constructive criticism.’

   Harry wriggles his eyebrows at her. ‘Only cos I never get any complaints.’

   ‘I might have had a complaint,’ Louis says smoothly.

   Zayn smirks proudly.

   Harry pouts. ‘And what was that, exactly?’

   ‘You’re all dick and no cock.’

   Perrie, Eleanor, Zayn, Niall, and even Danielle all collapse with laughter.

   But Harry looks like he’s been slapped; so hurt, in fact, that Louis is almost concerned. ‘Harry?’ he says quietly, under the others’ shrieks. He reaches out to touch him, but Harry moves away. Then he turns on his heel and walks out of the door.

   ‘Wow,’ Perrie says, as they watch him go. ‘He _really_ doesn’t respond well to criticism. Lou, I think you broke him.’

   Louis winces.

   Niall sees that he’s genuinely worried, and cracks a grin at him. ‘He’ll be fine, mate. We’ve all seen his cock; we know it’s fine.’

   ‘I haven’t,’ Zayn says haughtily.

   Danielle wrinkles her nose. ‘You will. No fucking boundaries, that boy.’

   Zayn glares at the desk. ‘You can say that again.’

   Niall pats his shoulder, then leaves his hand there as he stands. ‘I’ll go check on him.’

   Louis gives Zayn a beseeching look. _I know he’s kind of an arsehole but I’m kind of in love with him and I need to know if he’s alright._

   Zayn lets out a long-suffering sigh. ‘Me and Louis will come too. Girls, you just run through a few of your lines, OK?’

   They find Harry folded up outside on the stairs, on the phone. His voice is low, and breathy. His eyes are shut. ‘Yeah, I’m your baby. Want you so bad, Daddy, want your hands all over me, your dick inside me… _ahh,_ yeah, yeah I’m ready, God, I need you, your mouth, your fingers…’

   Niall snaps his fingers in front of his face. ‘Styles!’

   He opens his eyes, gives them a lazy smile, and keeps talking. ‘Mmm, fuck, keep talking to me, love your voice, love you telling me what to do, _uh, yes…’_ And Louis watches in absolute shock as he flawlessly fakes an orgasm, right in front of them.

   Afterwards, he pouts, and his voice comes out all cracked and quiet. ‘I’m all messy now, Daddy.’

   ‘Fucking hell balls,’ Zayn mutters. ‘Some of us actually _have_ dads to look in the eye.’

   Harry purrs – Louis’s stomach clenches; it’s a sound he recognises Harry’s stolen from him – then says ‘Bye Daddy,’ and hangs up.

   Louis and Zayn both jump a mile as Niall lets out a peal of raucous laughter. ‘That was the most convincing one I’ve ever seen.’

   Harry shrugs. He’s not even half-hard. Louis’s cock is straining against his skinny jeans. ‘You know I work better with an audience.’

   ‘Who was that?’ Louis asks, because he feels it’s a perfectly reasonable question.

   ‘Ben,’ Niall says, at the same time as Harry intones ‘None of your business.’

   ‘Why were you faking it?’

   Harry gives him a look not unlike the one someone might give a six year old asking about the birds and the bees. Except instead of _sometimes, when a mummy and daddy love each other very much,_ his speech sarcastically starts ‘Sometimes, when a rich middle-aged man likes a teenage boy, said teenage boy lets him believe he’s in his league because then he’ll give him money.’

   ‘So basically,’ Zayn says, obviously unimpressed, ‘you’re a prostitute.’

   ‘Basically,’ Harry agrees calmly, then he stands. ‘And he wants me right now so in a couple of hours I’m going to need a lot of strong alcohol. Meet at the club?’

   ‘Meet at the club,’ Niall agrees, like all of that made any sense to him at all, and Harry all but evaporates.

   ‘You said we wouldn’t leave him alone,’ Louis points out. His hands are shaking and he’s still hard, both of which he’s blaming on the fact that his head is an absolute mess of confusion, concern and arousal.

   ‘He’s not alone,’ Niall assures him. ‘Ben’s not ideal, but Harry can handle him.’

   Louis remembers the Snapchat. The old man. Harry’s ravaged chest.

   He tries to trust Niall. But all through the rest of the rehearsal his foot taps incessantly, and all he wants to do is swoop into the sky, Louis the Brave, and rescue Harry.

 

*

When Harry shows up at the club, he’s clearly already drunk, but when Louis helpfully points this out he just pulls an unfamiliar wallet out of his jeans and waves it in his face, as if that’s an answer, before throwing it at Niall and Zayn and telling them to get some screwdrivers. Already a little smashed, they oblige, and Louis, still completely sober, finds himself alone with Harry for the first time in a week.

   ‘Are you OK?’ he asks quietly.

   Harry scowls at him. ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’

   Louis doesn’t say anything. Harry puts a hand on his thigh, but he pushes it away, and Harry’s still staring at him ages later when Niall and Zayn finally reappear empty-handed, Niall sporting a bloody nose and Zayn limping on his arm with bruises all over his face.

   And Louis realises for the first time how Zayn must have felt when he saw him broken and battered and split open over Harry Styles. Because Louis wants to wrap him up in six dozen blankets, track down whoever did this to them, and break them in half. ‘Oh my God, what happened?’

   ‘I told Liam we were dating,’ Niall explains as he shoves Harry aside to make room for both Zayn and him, pushing Zayn’s fringe back to examine his bleeding forehead, ‘and he punched me in the face. So Zayn went for him and Liam beat him up.’

   ‘He did not _beat me up –’_

   ‘Wait, rewind.’ Harry catches Louis’s eye, frowning. ‘Who’s dating?’

   ‘Us,’ Zayn says, dejectedly picking up an icy glass and holding it to the worst bruise on his cheek, his mouth a bitter bloody gash. ‘Me and Niall. Surprise.’

   Niall smiles apologetically. ‘We didn’t want to tell you until…’

   ‘We didn’t want to tell you,’ Zayn confirms. ‘Niall, babe, are you OK? I can go back and –’

   ‘Don’t even think about it,’ Niall retorts. ‘I don’t give a fuck about Liam Payne. I care about you. OK, Malik Man? Come on, we should probably go home.’

   ‘Malik Man,’ Louis murmurs, as if it’s really a surprise to him at this point that Niall knows about it. He probably has his very own character.

   They’re dating.

   Why didn’t Zayn tell him?

   ‘Please tell me this is a joke,’ Harry pipes up weakly.

   Zayn glares at him as best as he can with a fast-blackening eye. ‘Why exactly would it be a joke?’

   ‘You’re supposed to be with _Liam!’_ Harry wails. ‘I spent fucking _months_ trying to set you up and now you tell me –’

   ‘Harry, Liam tried to break my nose because I told him I was gay. You would have had to rethink that plan anyway. I don’t even like Liam anyway, I never did. Which you would have known if you thought about anyone other than yourself.’

   Silence. Louis feels a chill run down his spine. Harry looks like he’s the one who’s been punched in the face.

   Niall looks like he can’t quite believe his outburst himself. ‘Umm. Zayn, do you want to maybe take the bus home?’

   Zayn glances at Louis, worried. ‘Louis, you can come too.’

   ‘I’m not coming with you!’ Louis’s face starts to burn as he remembers how many times he’s tagged along with them; how many times they’ve probably been giving each other desperate looks over his head because he wouldn’t leave them by themselves. No way is he being that guy again. Tonight, their agreement is less important than Zayn and Niall being happy. ‘No. You go. You OK, Zayn?’

   ‘Yeah, it’s fine.’ He leans across the table to draw Louis into a hug. Two-armed again. He still isn’t convinced then. ‘Don’t go home with him,’ he whispers. ‘Make him take you back to yours. Promise.’

   Louis makes a non-committal noise which he assumes Zayn choses to take as a yes because, within a blink, he and his boyfriend Niall are gone.

   Harry breathes out, hard. ‘So. That was unexpected.’

‘You’re telling me.’

   ‘Want to dance?’

   ‘No.’ Is this the first time Louis’s said no to him? It feels wrong, but good at the same time. Like progress. ‘Harry?’

   ‘Mmm.’

   ‘Maybe you should take me home.’

   ‘OK.’ He takes Louis’s arm as they stand, letting him lean into him for protection from the grabbing hands and spilling drinks. ‘You only ever needed to ask, Lou.’

   Out in the cold he pulls him closer, and for a moment Louis shuts his eyes and wishes it had always been like this: romantic and warm and giving, with just a hint of heat. That’s all he’s ever wanted, really. It’s what Niall and Zayn have, he can see that now that he thinks about it, how sweet they are together, how much they obviously love each other.

   So what’s wrong with Louis?

  ‘You’re shivering,’ Harry comments, slightly detachedly. Pause. ‘It hasn’t been just us for ages.’

   ‘I know.’

   ‘Zayn doesn’t like me.’

   _If you think about he’s actually got a pretty good reason._ ‘No.’

   ‘You still like me though, don’t you?’

   _Good question._ ‘Mmm.’

   ‘That’s good. Coming home, then?’

   Louis pretends not to know perfectly well which home he means. ‘Yeah. Take me home.’

 

*

In the cab that Harry calls to take them home, Harry kisses Louis and Louis lets him. He tastes like straight vodka, the sharp chemical tang of nail polish remover, and someone else’s hot, whisky-soaked breath. He mumbles _I missed you_ into Louis’s mouth and it’s so much of what he wants that his heart can barely hold it. Harry unsnaps his seatbelt and clambers almost on top of him, his leg pressing between Louis’s thighs, and Louis allows it – but when Harry tries to slip his hand beneath Louis’s waistband, he takes his wrist and laces their fingers together, so it’s almost innocent. Harry makes a disappointed noise, but he doesn’t fight it. Louis thinks for a moment that he might not even want to take it farther tonight; that they can just cuddle and sleep like regular tired out boyfriends after a long night.

   But as soon as they’re inside Harry’s house, a switch seems to flick, and he suddenly slams Louis against the wall by his hips before biting down hard on his lower lip. Louis whimpers and tries to squirm away, but Harry holds him fast, keeping a grip on him as he pushes him backwards up the stairs and into his bedroom. They don’t even make it to his bed, already on the floor before the door swings shut. Louis’s on his back and his T-shirt is rucked up, the carpet burning on his bare skin. Harry’s full weight is on him, his tongue like a lightning bolt, one hand between his legs and the other in his hair and it’s so _hot,_ but Louis can’t let him, he has to know that he can say no, that Harry will listen.

   ‘Harry,’ he mumbles, as Harry leaves off his mouth to nibble at his neck. ‘Stop.’

   Harry doesn’t answer. He bites down, hard.

   Louis whimpers, then his hands find Harry’s chest and he flattens his palms, pushing. ‘I said _stop.’_

   He doesn’t. His body presses against Louis’s like rock, but he’s obviously completely unaware of his presence as a human, incessantly muttering _‘So pretty, so small, I’m gonna_ wreck _you.’_

   Tears fill Louis’s eyes because he can’t bear the idea that this is how people treat Harry; that this is all he knows; that he can’t understand the word _stop._

   But he isn’t going to let Harry drag him into this too. For once, he puts himself first. He summons up all his strength, and then he slaps Harry’s face as hard as he can.

   Harry physically tumbles sideways, stunned. Free of his weight, Louis instantly stands, fumbling in his pocket to check for his Oyster card and his keys so he can get the hell out of here because if he stays Harry won’t stop and that knowledge makes his heart feel like it’s breaking but he can’t help him, not now, not without destroying himself. His neck stings like crazy where the cold air hits the lovebite (fuckbite?), still wet from his spit, and it helps him focus.

   Harry sits up slowly, like he’s dazed. He ends up eye-level with Louis’s crotch, and he smirks at the fact that he’s quite obviously hard. ‘Oh, you wanna be in charge, Lou? What are you gonna do, Daddy, spank me?’

   ‘Jesus Christ, you need to shut the fuck up.’

   Obediently, he zips his lips and then folds his arms on his lap, looking innocently up at Louis. It’s supposed to be sexy, but it’s sickening.

   Louis turns away. ‘Go to bed, Harry. I’m going home.’

   He gapes, momentarily shocked out of his sexified state. ‘What? But Lou, it’s _dark._ You live in –’

   ‘Well I’d rather get stabbed than stay here with you!’ Louis yells, his voice high-pitched and cracked and disappearing altogether in the middle. And it’s true, he realises, delayed tremors rocking through his body. Harry doesn’t understand consent, and that’s terrifying. It’s the final push Louis needs to put as much distance between them as possible.

   Harry still looks confused. ‘Why?’

   _‘Why?_ Because I fucking said _stop,_ Harry!’ Louis screams, desperate to get through to him how fucked up this is; how much Ben and Nick and Flack have screwed him up. ‘I said no and you…you…this is why we needed a fucking safeword!’

   ‘I was just gonna suck you off, for Christ’s sake, we’ve done that loads of times before –’

   ‘But I _didn’t want you to!_ Doing something with me once doesn’t mean unlimited access to it for the rest of time! We just had a fight and I’ve been sad for weeks because of you, why would you think we could go straight back to normal? That’s not how it works!’

   ‘You wanted to come home with me!’

   ‘To _talk!’_

   ‘So talk!’

   ‘No! I’ve given you thousands of fucking opportunities to talk. You clearly never wanted to. Why would you? You’re clearly not interested in my _conversational skills.’_

   ‘Well yeah, Lou, in case you haven’t noticed, you’re fit and I like sex. I told you that’s what it was going to be. It’s not my fucking fault you fell in love with me.’

   _‘Love_ you? I _hate_ you!’ Louis screams, and that’s not true but he needs to get out of here, and Harry isn’t going to let him leave unless he believes he truly wants to. ‘The sky is blue, you’re a psychopath and I fucking hate you!’

   Harry raises an eyebrow, obnoxious, sure, as he points out of his window into the dark, black night. ‘Does that sky look blue to you?’

   Louis throws himself at him. And not in the way he has before. This time it’s with his nails and his fists and his knees, because apparently ‘body’ is the only language Harry understands. But Harry retaliates in about the same way as he always has: he pins Louis to the bed and kisses him.

   But he’s not a bad person, so when Louis fights back, he lets go. ‘Jesus. Fine. Here.’ He doesn’t even hand Louis money, just the wallet he flashed earlier, now lying on his bedside table from the bar. ‘Just…get a taxi. Keep it. I don’t care.’

   ‘I don’t want your money,’ Louis spits.

   ‘It’s not mine, it’s Ben’s.’

 ‘Then I definitely don’t fucking want it, do I?’

   ‘Please, Lou.’ There’s a genuine plea in his voice. ‘You shouldn’t be walking home alone –’

   ‘There is such a thing as a _bus,_ Harry.’

   Harry looks at him like he’s suggested he crawl on his hands and knees through the gutter. ‘You’re not taking a _bus_ at three in the morning!’

   ‘This might surprise you,’ Louis retorts, ‘but not all of us have a choice in the matter. And no one’s going to do anything to me that you haven’t already.’

   That throws him. He takes a step backwards, his bravado wavering. ‘But…’

   ‘Goodbye, Harry,’ Louis says, as coldly as he can, backing away too. Pain claws at him from every angle but he’s used to that by now, barely stumbling. ‘If it’s all the same to you, which it probably is, I don’t think we should see each other anymore. Not the way we have been. You’re…too much for me. I need something – someone – normal.’

   Harry doesn’t answer. He’s been thrown into shadow and Louis can’t see his face.

   He leaves before he can cave.

   He tries so hard not to think about how much he still wants Harry to call him back.


	11. I Hope You Choke

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Louis has a sleepover with Ziall and kisses girls. Zayn protects and placates. Niall rails against the system. Harry chokes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another brief mention of self-harm (it's the last one, i promise)  
> i can't believe i've left it so long i'm so sorry, i completely lost track of time! the next one will be up asap, thank you for your patience and hope you like this one x

Zayn and Niall are cute together, Louis has to admit. It certainly hurts like hell watching them together. And that’s with them clearly trying not to be too wrapped up in each other in order to give him pitying looks and hand-pats.

   No one’s said anything for a while. Louis thinks that they aren’t sure how to broach the subject. They’ve already exhausted Niall’s extensive topics of conversation regarding old movies with plot twists – all of which Zayn knows now – and done the obligatory catch-up on their EPQs (all going well although none of them has been what you’d call motivated in that area recently).

   It’s been a week since Louis walked out on Harry. Since then he’s been trying his best to stay away from everyone. The only physical contact he’s dared to broach were another couple of slashes with the sharpener blade, but all that ever did was make him cry, so he stopped.

   Zayn gave him a few days to himself (Louis assumed Harry had given Niall the story), but after four he came around to his house and cuddled him until he felt just a tiny bit human again. Then he talked to Louis for even longer, not mentioning Niall or even Harry once. They talked about old times, and all the fun they’d had together, and all the friends Zayn never bothered making because _you were literally the only person I’d ever even liked a little._ He told Louis to call Stan and tell him he was alright because he’d resorted to bugging Zayn, and Louis realised how many missed calls he actually had from his old friend when Zayn forced him to look at his phone. So he did, and within minutes Stan had him cracking up with stories of twinks and tricks and disastrous haircuts and equally disastrous experiments with bondage gear. He asked what Louis had been up to and he said he’d tell him sometime when he felt better about it. Then there were a lot of _I love yous_ and even after he hung up the weird feeling of betterness stayed.

   So today when Zayn asked if Louis might possibly want to come to Niall’s house with him to hang out because apparently _he loves you as much as me, mate,_ Louis obligingly said yes.

 And now all he wants to do is put his head under a pillow.

   Eventually, Niall clears his throat. ‘Umm, Louis?’

   ‘Yeah?’

  He glances at Zayn. ‘I just…I’m so sorry.’

   Zayn squeezes both of their hands. ‘I’m going to go make some coffee.’ He looks at Louis. ‘OK?’

   ‘OK,’ Louis mumbles, feeling like a four-year-old.

   After a lot of glancing back, he leaves them alone. Niall’s house is pretty big but nowhere near as huge as Harry’s, and it’s reassuring to be able to hear the faint whirr and hum of him making the drinks.

   ‘Anyway,’ Niall says quietly. ‘I really am, Louis. This was as much my fault as his. I should have talked more to Harry…to Zayn…I left you on your own when I knew what he was doing and it fucking kills me, it really does.’

   ‘It’s not your fault, mate.’

   ‘Yeah it is. I was so wrapped up in Zayn and…sorry. I feel terrible about that too, you know, like maybe if we hadn’t been so distracted we could have helped you…’

   ‘Niall. Seriously. It’s OK. I mean, God, it’s Zayn, of course you were distracted. And…I’m really glad you two are together. I love him to bits but it’s good knowing I’m not…the only one he needs anymore. You know what I mean?’

   ‘Yeah. I do.’ He smiles slightly sleepily. ‘He’s amazing. Umm. Sorry.’

   ‘It’s fine. You’re good, I promise.’

   ‘Thanks man.’ He takes Louis’s hand as if to shake it, but then he holds on. ‘Just so you know, Harry’s an idiot. He’d have been lucky to have you.’

   ‘Mmm.’

   ‘Honestly. I was so jealous of you when we first started hanging out, you know? I mean, you’re gorgeous, funny, clever, you’re always gonna be Zayn’s first love…’

   ‘Hey.’ Louis puts his arm around him. ‘You’re all those things too. And I’m willing to bet you’ll always be the one he loves now.’

   Niall blushes. ‘We’ll see, I guess.’

   Louis hesitates. ‘Thanks, by the way. For looking after him when I couldn’t.’

   ‘Jesus, Louis.’ Suddenly, inexplicably, Niall throws his arms around him. He smells like honey and mint, and he’s soft and yielding and loving and sweet. ‘I promise you, from now on I’m going to look after you both.’

 

*

‘And he does,’ Louis’s telling his therapist the next day, her dog (whose name is Lottie, like his little sister) held firmly on his lap. ‘I mean, he tries.’

   But there are times he can’t, obviously. He can’t protect Louis in Philosophy when Harry passes him notes while Flack’s back is turned, and runs his foot up and down Louis’s leg under the desk.

   He can’t protect him from Harry’s texts, invariably unread and deleted but at least one always just _sitting_ there in his messages, demanding his attention.

   He can’t protect him when one Saturday he switched on Nick Grimshaw’s radio show and listened to the full hour, and how Harry’s voice was wrecked and how quiet he was, his gasps audible whenever Grimshaw touched him.

   He can’t protect Louis when he’s alone in bed at night, feeling like he’s freezing to death without him.

   But he and Zayn try their best, and most of the time things are OK, even if Louis is still wildly jealous of them.

   It does help, though, that Zayn still makes sure that he spends alone time with Louis. They never discuss it, he just asks Louis around to his house and then Niall won’t be there. And even if we they’re just watching a movie or playing cards, he’ll leave his phone in his pocket, switched off. It feels like they’re achieving balance.

   ‘But I still miss Harry like crazy,’ Louis confesses quietly. ‘It’s like there’s this itch, right at my core where I can’t reach. And sometimes it just balloons into emptiness, even when I’m surrounded by people.’

   ‘That will ease,’ his therapist says softly. ‘It sounds like you’re doing well, considering the circumstances. Just stay strong and keep spending time with your friends.’

   Louis nods, although inside he can’t help stupidly wishing that there was some magic piece of advice she could give him that would just clean him out completely and make him OK again.

   Rehearsals are the worst. Harry never dares touch him or even speak to him under the watchful eyes of Zayn and Niall, but he never takes his eyes off him, and Louis can’t help but see him twitch whenever he gets too close to Perrie or Eleanor. Sometimes it makes Louis so scared that he has to leave the hall.

   And yet the play progresses, and soon Zayn is spraypainting the set and Niall is going hoarse with yelling that _we have THREE WEEKS, people!_ and Louis is so nervous that he constantly feels like he’s going to throw up.

   The cast has a get-together at Harry’s house in lieu of an after-party since Eleanor, Perrie and Harry himself will be on holiday over Christmas. Louis wasn’t going to go but Zayn and Niall begged, promising they’d look after him.

   And they do. They all get drunk and inevitably Harry takes a dive in Louis’s direction but Zayn gets there first, slamming a fist square into his jaw. After that he leaves Louis alone, although when he goes to the bathroom in the night he still treads as carefully as if he were still scared of the dark, terrified Harry will follow him like he did that night before everything else had torn them apart.

   When Eleanor kisses Louis, Zayn doesn’t punch her but he does pull her gently away. By the end of the night she’s making out with Perrie instead while Zayn and Niall gasp into each other’s mouths and Louis realises it’s the first time he’s seen them kiss.

   When Harry ends up getting off with Danielle, Louis watches in silence from his spot alone on the sofa, sucking at the remains of the gin like it’s a baby bottle. Harry’s hands are fisted in her long, curly hair and his tongue laps at her lips insistently until she lets him inside and her skirt is rucked up by the friction of his jeans and it’s like watching a hurricane rip the world apart. In all the stories he’s told Louis; in all the pictures he’s sent; in everything Louis imagined, he’s never actually seen him with someone else.

   The end of the night sees Louis on his knees in the bathroom, throwing up into the toilet.

 

*

The next day Harry sits with them at lunch, sliding in next to Louis, opposite Niall and Zayn. Instantly Louis is lost in his smell, his head spinning with their proximity, the closest they’ve been in weeks.

   ‘No,’ Zayn states.

   Louis jumps, and Harry frowns. ‘What?’

   ‘You’re not sitting next to him.’ He quickly squeezes Niall’s hand, and then stands. ‘Up. I’m not kicking you off the table but if you’re staying you’re sitting next to Niall.’

   Harry rolls his eyes, sighing heavily. ‘Whatever.’

   ‘And less of the bloody attitude.’

   And so it is with minimal sass that Harry gets himself seated next to Niall. Zayn takes his vacated spot, placing his hand protectively on Louis’s knee. Louis’s head hurts, but at least now he has an anchor.

   There’s silence for an uncomfortably long time, save for the shrieks of their fellow students and a teacher’s occasional bellow of _PICK THAT UP RIGHT NOW!_

   ‘Why are you here?’ Zayn asks at last.

  Harry goes red. ‘I’ve been sitting at this table since before Niall knew you existed, Malik.’

   ‘Yeah, before he knew you were a –’

   ‘Please don’t fight,’ Niall interrupts, giving Zayn a pleading look. ‘For me. And Louis.’ A painful pause. ‘What have you been up to, Haz?’

   ‘Nothing much.’ His tone is clipped, his eyes on Louis although he refuses to look up. ‘Lou, how have you –’

   ‘Don’t talk to him.’

   ‘It’s a free fucking country.’

   Louis nearly starts out of his skin as Zayn slams his hand down on the table, his fingers digging into Louis’s leg. ‘You didn’t seem so concerned about _freedom_ when you –’

   ‘Don’t!’ Louis cries. He can’t bear to hear him say it.

   Harry’s face is pale. ‘Jesus, Lou, what the fuck did you tell him?’

   ‘Guys –’

   ‘He didn’t _tell_ me anything; it was only scratched six centimetres deep all over his chest!’

   ‘So I bet he didn’t tell you how much he loved it, did he?’

   ‘Harry!’

   ‘Or how he begged for it?’

   ‘Harry, don’t –’

   ‘Or were you just jealous because he’d never let _you_ do that to him, lover boy?’

   Niall gasps like he’s been punched in the stomach, choked and ragged. After ten seconds shot through with Zayn’s stunned silence he jumps up and runs out of the cafeteria, a sob slipping from his mouth.

   Zayn recovers himself, desperately calling out ‘Niall, wait –’ but he’s already gone.

   ‘What the fuck is wrong with you?’ Louis suddenly spits at Harry, startling all three of them. He feels like his head is going to explode, not with sorrow or fear, but anger. How dare he smash Zayn and Niall’s sweet bubble and corrupt the air around them with his darkness? How dare he, once more, make everything about him?

   Harry falters. ‘I…Jesus Christ I’m fucking sorry, alright. Are you happy now?’ With a clatter of plates, he stands up once more and strides out of the back door, leaving his untouched cookie on the table.

   Zayn puts his head in his hands. ‘Oh God. I fucked up. Louis, I fucked up.’

   Zayn can’t comfort him this time, Louis realises. It’s finally his turn again.

   He put his arm around him. ‘You didn’t fuck up, mate. Harry caught you off guard. Niall knows you love him. To be quite frank, if he doesn’t he’s not smart enough for you.’

   Zayn splutters slightly. ‘Really?’

   _‘Yes._ God. And I told him ages ago you weren’t in love with me anymore. From the horse’s mouth, so to speak. It’ll be fine. But go after him now.’

   He looks up at Louis, and Louis is shocked at how damp his eyes are. He really does love Niall. ‘Are you going to be OK?’

   ‘Yes.’ Louis kicks him gently under the table. ‘Go.’

   And after a quick one-armed hug Zayn does, like lightning.

   Later he tells Louis that he found Niall crying in the toilets and he kissed away all his tears until his lips were sore and then he got down on his knees and told him he loved him more than anyone else in the world – more than anyone had _ever_ loved anyone else in the world. And that Niall burst into tears all over again and by the end of break they were both sobbing their hearts out in each other’s arms. ‘And then he said he loved me too.’

   So essentially, it all worked out fine.

   And Louis is happy for them.

   And he only briefly thinks about calling Harry.

 

*

_I hope you choke._

   That was what Louis wrote on the back of his hand, out of anger and frustration and sorrow, the day before Harry and Flack are called out of Philosophy by the head teacher.

   ‘Choke’ has three meanings: to block your airways, or to literally or figuratively ‘drop the ball’.

   They dropped the ball alright. Some stray student peeped into Flack’s classroom looking for a lost homework diary and found Harry straddling her on her swivel chair. They ran to their friends, who ran to their parents, who wrote to the head, who took the decision to fire Flack and put Harry in therapy.

   ‘But he’s already in therapy so they just left it. They told his Mum but since she’s of the opinion that if it was consenting it’s not her problem and he’s a boy so it must have been consenting, all she said was that it was irresponsible of him to get her fired because he couldn’t keep it in his trousers.’ Niall sits back with a heavy sigh. ‘That’s all he’s told me. I don’t know whether he feels guilty or he’s in shock.’

   Zayn pats his shoulder. ‘That sounds rough for him. Have they talked to you about it, since you guys are friends?’

   ‘Nope. It’s not like they’re building a court case. The deal was a lawsuit or her ‘resignation’. They’ve hushed it all up; told the kids’ parents it was a misunderstanding. That’s how it works around here. Everything swept under the rug. All they care about is their reputation. They hire shitty teachers and blame us when we get bad marks. They give us three hours of homework a night and stuff us with sugar and fat to keep us awake. They ignore Harry and Flack for over a year, up until they can’t anymore. Of course they knew before; they were hardly subtle about it. But they don’t care about us.’

   Louis and Zayn both stare at him. Louis hasn’t seen him this pissed off since…well, ever. Upset, yes. Worried, yes. Comforting, yes. But not angry.

   Zayn gives him a hug. ‘I’m sure he’ll be alright, Niall. Do you…want to text him? He can sit with us, if you want.’

   Louis wants to be annoyed that Zayn would sacrifice his mental health for Niall’s, but he sees the effort it’s taking Zayn to do it, and he knows he’s still trying to prove to Niall that, regardless of whether he loved Louis first, it’s him he loves now. Louis understands, and when Zayn shoots him an apologetic look he nods in reassurance.

   Niall sniffs, and shakes his head. ‘He’s not in school. Told me he was staying with Ben for a bit. Because that’s totally going to help him at this point. His exact words were _‘I wanna get fucked out of my mind so I don’t have to think about it’.’_

   Louis winces. Despite himself, he felt desperately sad for Harry. For all the wonderful things he said about his mother; for all of how much he clearly worshipped her, from what Louis can tell she doesn’t really care about him at all, or at the very least gave up on him long ago. With Flack out of his life, he has no one to baby him. No one to make him feel like a child. No Mummy, weird as Louis’s always found that concept. Poor kid.

   ‘I’m sorry, Lou,’ Niall mutters, reluctantly extracting himself from Zayn. ‘I know he was a dick to you – and he _is,_ in so many ways, but it’s just…he was my best friend.’

   ‘I get it,’ Louis tells him, patting his hand. ‘It sucks. I hope he’s OK.’ He catches himself. ‘But maybe don’t tell him I said that.’ He’s in absolutely no mood for Harry to get any ideas, no matter how sorry he feels for him. One thing is certainly clear: Louis had a lucky escape. Harry is fucked up and damaged and dangerous and contagious, and no way is Louis ever getting mixed up in him ever again.

   His fingers twitch all afternoon, but he doesn’t text Harry once.

   He’s just thankful that he returns the favour.


	12. The Life-Affirming Experience Of Being Fucked Up The Arse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zayn gets inspiration - and laid. Harry asks Louis out. Niall ruins any good feelings they might have had towards handcuffs and ice cream. Louis learns how to take care of himself, and Harry learns how to take care of him. Liam doesn't learn anything.

At the very last minute, Zayn dashes backstage, pink-faced and sparkly-eyed, and takes Louis by the hands. ‘Change of plan,’ he pants. ‘Niall’s idea. You do the kiss with Perrie. And tell her you love her. And make _sure_ they know exactly who you guys are. William Shakespeare and William Hughes. Alright?’

   ‘But the school –’

   ‘Fuck the school.’ He kisses Louis on the cheek rapturously. ‘Fuck them up the _arse.’_

   ‘Umm…are you alright?’

   ‘Niall fucked me up the arse,’ he says conversationally, still beaming like a lunatic.

   Louis heard Harry and Perrie both choke on their own spit.

   ‘Mate, that’s…great.’ Did Liam give him coke again? ‘Umm…anything else?’

   ‘I’m gay!’ he cries, spinning Louis in a 360. ‘I’m gay and Shakespeare was gay and they’re all going to know it no matter what happens!’

   ‘That you’re gay or that Shakespeare was gay?’

   ‘Both!’ He suddenly lunges for the drawn curtains. Louis has a sudden vision of him racing out on the stage and screaming his sexuality into the audience. He pictures Zayn waking up out of whatever high he’s on right now and straight-up vomiting into the teachers’ reserved seats.

   Harry seems to have the same premonition because he goes after Zayn at the same time as Louis, and help him restrain Zayn until he appears to have calmed down slightly.

   ‘Thanks,’ Louis mutters shortly as Harry backs away. He doesn’t stick around to register Harry’s reaction, immediately returning his attention to his friend. ‘Zayn? We’re all really happy for you but we’re on in five and you need to be in the audience, mate. How else are we going to know what we’re doing wrong?’

   He blinks a couple of times, lucidity returning to some extent. ‘Right. Yeah.’ The pink in his cheeks darkens to red. ‘Umm…I said all that out loud didn’t I? Like, really loud?’

   Louis gives him a hug. ‘Loud and clear, love. Go sit down. Is the kiss still on?’

   He nods vigorously. ‘Absolutely. I know we haven’t rehearsed it but I figure you can handle one snog on your own. Just give it everything you got, OK?’

   ‘Will do.’ Louis presses his lips to Zayn’s forehead, then gives him a gentle push. ‘Go sit with your boyfriend. And maybe save further fucking up the arse until after the performance, yeah?’

   ‘Oh _God,’_ he groans as he sheepishly backs out.

   Louis glances back at his co-stars, who all have their fingers stuffed in their mouths to stifle their raucous laughter.

   ‘I will _never_ look at him the same way again,’ Perrie splutters. ‘That is fucking incredible.’

   ‘Hey.’ Louis punches her shoulder softly. ‘You’re William Hughes and it’s none of your business whether Zayn and Niall are, to use his charming term of phrase, fucking up the arse. I trust you were paying enough attention to know that we’re kissing, then?’

   ‘Of course.’ She beams brightly. ‘I look forward to it. But if we’re going passionate then I’m going to tell you right now, put your tongue anywhere near El’s teeth and I’ll slaughter you.’

   ‘You guys are dating now?’

 She ruffles Louis’s hair. ‘Keep up, Cindy-Lou.’

   ‘Will do, Pez-Dispenser.’

   ‘Everyone!’ Zayn’s calm, clear voice rings out from his microphone, not a trace of stage fright evident, and Louis’s heart swells with pride. ‘Hi there, my name’s Zayn Malik and the play we are about to present to you is a love story, although perhaps not in the conventional sense. I hope you enjoy it and –’

   ‘Oi, Malik! You missed out the most important part there, babe!’

   ‘Oh yes, it was directed by Niall Horan over there –’

   ‘The _most_ important part, you twonk!’

   ‘Huh?’

   ‘My boyfriend up there wrote it with his own two hands, ladies and gents! Let’s have a round of applause for Mr. Zayn Malik!’

   ‘Oh no, really…’

   Louis bites down on his lip hard, silently thanking Niall for not letting Zayn walk away without taking the credit he deserves. No matter what Louis feels on his darkest days, he will never not be glad that they ended up together.

   The play goes off without a hitch. When Harry started showing up to school again after the Flack debacle, he’d apparently given up on trying to get at Louis during rehearsals, and he didn’t so much as brush against him by accident during the entire performance. He’s seemed far more subdued recently, and Niall mentioned to Louis at one point that he was still staying with Ben, bar the occasional night with Nick Grimshaw. Time and time again Louis’s ached to talk to him, to tell him that he’s worth more than what they want from him, but by now he knows better. One touch and Harry would be underneath his fingernails again, so he stayed away and so did Harry.

   And yet it’s him Louis imagines in front of him during his love scenes with Perrie. His mouth he conjures up when they kiss. His memory prompting his tears when Perrie walks away from him.

   But as they bask in their applause afterwards, while Zayn and Niall kiss to a standing ovation centre-stage, and Louis glances at Harry only to see him jerk his head behind the curtain, indicating a dark, empty space left open to whatever no-strings tryst they want, he looks away.

   And when he goes home and crawls into bed, he falls asleep instantly.

   He doesn’t even cry.

 

*

Zayn comes around to Louis’s house the next day, alone. As soon as Louis opens the door, he thrusts a massive bouquet of lilies into his face. ‘Niall said that Harry said that he wanted you to have these. If I were you I’d shred them but Niall said I should give you the choice. Although why he thought you’d wanted twenty symbols of death and/or virginity lying around is beyond me.’

   ‘I see you’ve recovered,’ Louis teases, taking the flowers. They smell sickly-sweet, but they’re beautiful and he appreciates the gesture, so he puts them in a vase of water as a surprise for his mum.

   Zayn blushes. ‘Sorry about that. Apparently sex gives you an endorphin rush that I wasn’t emotionally equipped to handle.’

   ‘Is that what Niall says?’

   ‘Yes it – hey.’

   ‘Well you do say it a lot. I still love you though,’ Louis adds as Zayn follows him into his room. ‘So what’s up?’

 ‘It was mostly the flowers,’ Zayn admits. ‘I actually have plans with Niall later. But I just wanted to say thank you. You were amazing last night.’

   ‘Oh stop. I bet I wasn’t as amazing as Niall.’

   ‘What do you…hey!’

   ‘Mate, you looked me right in the eye and said ‘Niall fucked me up the arse’. You can’t expect me to ever let you live that down, right?’

   ‘You could show some _maturity_ about the matter –’

   ‘Absolutely not.’ Louis flicks him on the nose. ‘So do I get to hear about the amazing sex that you came out of looking like a Dutch doll?’

   ‘Absolutely not,’ Zayn retorts. ‘To get back to the matter in hand, you were amazing and that’s good because the play was actually my EPQ. I didn’t want to tell you until we’d pulled it off cos I knew you’d freak out.’

   Louis gasps in mock-outrage. ‘Is that why the last-minute change? To give you something interesting to write about? Not at all to do with the life-affirming experience of being fucked up –’

   ‘I swear to God if you say that one more time I’m…divorcing you.’

   ‘You were much better at making threats around Styles, just so you know.’

   Zayn flinches.

   Guilt grips Louis, even though it’s not as if Harry ever touched Zayn. Louis should be able to make jokes about it by now, but he knows that the incident has shaken Zayn just as badly as it has Louis, and that he still feels bad about it. Louis doesn’t want to open old wounds, so he apologises.

   ‘Is it…any better?’ Zayn asks cautiously.

   ‘Yeah,’ Louis tells him truthfully. ‘Much. And you’ve seen him – he doesn’t even go near me anymore.’

   ‘Mmm. And are you…OK with that?’

   ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’

   ‘Well…I know you had feelings for him. I didn’t agree with them, but I knew. And I get that they haven’t necessarily…you know, gone away yet.’

   ‘I guess you’re right,’ Louis admits. ‘But it definitely doesn’t hurt as much anymore. I can live with it now. I could never have lived with being with him.’

   ‘That was never an option,’ Zayn says firmly. ‘I wouldn’t have let that happen.’

 ‘I know.’ Louis lets Zayn give him his usual one-armed embrace, leaning into his shoulder contentedly. ‘I love you.’

   ‘I love you too.’

 

*

That night, long after Zayn’s left to be with Niall, Louis gets a text from Harry.

   But it’s not like the usual ones; full of flirty language and winky faces. It’s unadorned, simple – and more importantly, gentle. _Is it OK if I call you?_

_Alright,_ Louis answers. He wants to show Harry that life would be easier for him if he was like this as a general rule.

   So when his phone rings he picks up.

   Harry’s voice sounds husky and small. ‘I hung out with Niall today.’

   ‘Oh,’ is Louis’s only response.

   ‘We had a really long talk about…about everything, really.’ Pause. ‘I broke it off with Ben. And Nick. I told them I needed to be alone for a while.’

   ‘Oh.’ Louis’s mind is blank with shock. ‘How…how did they react.’

   He chuckles, but it sounds bitter. ‘Told me I was getting too old for them anyway. That I’d be back on my knees in a day. I told them to go fuck themselves, or someone their own age. Ben tried to clock me, but I made a break for it.’

   ‘I’m proud of you,’ Louis says softly, and he really is because somewhere deep down he still feels this small claim on Harry. Still cares about him more than he wants to admit even to himself. ‘So where are you staying now?’

   ‘I went back to my mum. You know, my stepdad came into my room a few minutes ago and tried to high-five me about how hot Flack was.’ He sighs heavily. ‘Maybe Niall’s right, you know? Maybe she shouldn’t have slept with me.’

   _Maybe?_ Louis nearly says, but he bites his tongue. It’s not his fight, not anymore.

   ‘Louis?’ Harry says, after a moment or so of silence. His voice is thinner now, like it’s on the brink of breaking.

   ‘Yeah?’ Louis murmurs.

   ‘I’m sorry,’ he whispers. ‘About everything. Niall’s been researching all this stuff about sex and you were right, I was doing it all wrong. I was shit to you and you didn’t deserve it. I was rough with you because I was scared of you, you were the first person I’d ever slept with who could have hurt me inside. I can take pain, but I don’t let anyone touch my heart. So I hurt you before you could.’

   Louis feels a tear roll down his face. His heart is aching, and all he can think to do is play it off, make it a joke, so he says lightly ‘Good thing I didn’t.’

   ‘But you did,’ Harry says quietly.

   Louis’s throat tightens. ‘What?’

   ‘God, Lou, I love you, haven’t you figured that out? You’re the best person I’ve ever met. You tried to fix me. You made me feel like I was worth fixing.’ His voice does break, now, and Louis holds onto the phone harder, as if Harry can feel his touch through the screen. ‘And I fucked it up and I’m so, so sorry.’

   The tears are streaming now, and yet Louis’s voice still comes out calm although inside he’s falling apart all over again. But in a different way now. Where before it was Harry smashing his heart, now it’s just like the walls around it are quietly caving. Like he’s opening up again, in the most beautiful way. ‘I love you too. I can’t help it.’ He feels the phantom sting of rope around his wrists – and the walls quickly reconstruct themselves. ‘But you have to understand, Harry, I can’t be with you. Not after everything. I won’t put myself through that again.’

   ‘I know,’ Harry whispers. ‘But…can I take you on a date? Public place,’ he adds hurriedly. ‘I won’t touch you, you can leave whenever you want, it doesn’t have to be anything. But I’d like to give you something. Something happy. Will you let me?’

   Louis can barely understand what he’s hearing. It’s so different from anything he’s ever heard, from anyone, so different to what he thought he wanted just a few months ago, when he was sex-starved and cynical and obsessed with the Arctic Monkeys. But now, it’s like Harry’s offering him the entire universe in a snowglobe.

   ‘OK,’ he says softly. ‘I…I’d like that, I think. Thank you.’

   ‘Thank you,’ Harry breathes, and then they just stay there for a while, phones clasped to their ears, listening to each other’s breathing. It’s calm and quiet and sweet, and it’s not until about fifteen minutes later that Louis can bring himself to murmur ‘Night, Harry.’

   ‘Night, Lou,’ Harry murmurs, but he waits for Louis to hang up first.

*

The next night, Harry takes Louis out to a pizza place on a high street halfway between their houses. They sit at opposite sides of the table, not touching, and talk about their EPQs and the upcoming exams and how they feel now that the play’s over. Louis’s stomach periodically squeezes at their proximity, but Harry seems to sense whenever he feels uncomfortable and say something funny or random or weird that goes some way to setting him at ease again. Louis is enjoying himself, and it makes him remember how things used to be with Harry: slightly flirty friendship, that made him feel happy and a little giddy.

   Halfway through dessert, Harry offers to call him a taxi to get him home, but Louis shakes his head. He and Harry have more serious things to discuss, and despite Harry’s best intentions they can’t really talk about them in public. And he can no longer ignore the fact that he really, really wants to kiss him, but before he can do that there are definitely some ground rules to lay down.

   Harry looks uncertain when Louis asks if he’ll come back to his place with him, but he agrees. He pays the tab quietly and they walk back to Louis’s flat, their hands occasionally brushing.

   Louis’s mum is asleep by the time they get in so they sit in the kitchen together. Louis makes some tea, and waits until they’re both clasping their cups to warm their frozen hands before he starts to talk.

   ‘OK,’ he begins, not quite believing how in control he feels. ‘Here’s what’s going to happen tonight. We’re going to take it slow. If you want to stop, tell me and we’ll stop. If I want to stop, I’ll tell you and we’ll stop. I doubt we’re going to do anything that’s going to require a safeword but if we do we’ll think of one before we do it.’

   Harry just stares at him. ‘I thought –’

   ‘I know.’ Louis takes a sip of his tea, the heat clearing his head a little. ‘The truth is, I don’t know what I want. I love you and I want to touch you, but I don’t know if when I do that I’m going to get scared. I need to know that you’ll stop if I tell you to stop.’

   Harry nods quickly. ‘I will. I promise. I want you to feel safe, Lou, I –’

   ‘Also,’ Louis interrupts, ‘I get the feeling you’ve never felt you could say stop either. So I need you to _swear_ to me that you’ll tell me. Don’t hit me, don’t shove me, don’t yell at me – just tell me. Promise?’

   ‘Promise,’ Harry says, with fervour. His eyes are shining, but Louis can’t tell if it’s sadness or excitement or something else. ‘I love you, Lou. I’m not going to hurt you anymore.’

   ‘And if you do,’ Louis says, ‘I’m walking out on you and I’m never coming back.’

   ‘I know,’ Harry says, and Louis thinks that he really does. There’s no hint of sarcasm or smug. He knows that this is his last chance.

   And Louis thinks it’s time that he gets it, so he pushes their mugs into the middle of the table, takes Harry to the sofa and pushes him gently down on it, then straddles his lap and cups his face to kiss him deeply, fiercely, suddenly overwhelmed with the urge to eat him alive because it’s been so long since he’s tasted him, and forever since he’s truly wanted to, with no fears or trepidations or the knowledge that it will hurt. It’s just a kiss, just being close to the boy he still loves with all his heart, and when he undoes the top button of Harry’s shirt and sees a painful-looking bite mark he kisses that too, wanting to suck out all the pain Harry keeps below his skin.

   He feels Harry’s lips on his neck and he shivers – but when Harry hesitates Louis presses his hand to the back of his neck, murmurs _‘Yes’_ and Harry obligingly keeps going, and every new pocket of warmth that opens on Louis’s body is a firework in his blood.

   They end up stretched out on the sofa, shirtless, Harry on top now, grinding lazily as they lick into each other’s mouths, and for a few minutes it seems natural that it will escalate, move to the bedroom and play itself out like it always has before (not counting the night they fucked three feet away from their friends in Harry’s sitting room) – but when Louis forces himself to think about it, he knows that tonight, that’s not what he wants. Tonight, he just wants to kiss, and to sleep.

   ‘Harry?’ he says, pushing him briefly away.

   ‘Yeah?’

   Harry’s eyes are dark, and it makes him feel slightly sick because no good has ever come from Harry’s eyes being dark before, but he makes himself say it because they both promised and he needs to play his part too. ‘Let’s just do this, for tonight. I don’t think I’m ready. Is that OK?’

   And he hears how shaky his voice sounds because for a second he’s so scared that it’s going to go back to how it was before, and everything that’s happened in the past few weeks will be forgotten, and he can’t breathe…

   ‘Hey.’ Harry places a kiss on his forehead like a jewel. ‘Of course it’s OK. Do you want me to leave?’

   ‘No,’ Louis says, wrapping his arms around Harry’s waist. ‘I want you to stay with me. Will you stay with me?’

   Harry lowers himself down onto Louis’s body with a sigh, burying his face in Louis’s neck. ‘I’ll be here as long as you want me, Lou.’ Pause. ‘Can we go to sleep now?’

   Louis kind of wants to keep kissing, but he knows that there’ll be plenty of time for that tomorrow. The promise that they made will not be a one-time thing. They’re going to have to keep it always. They’re going to have to be so careful, so gentle, so aware of each other’s needs and feelings.

   But it’s going to be fun, too. And satisfying. And beautiful. ‘Sleep it is.’

   ‘I love you, Lou.’

   ‘I love you too, Harry.’

   And right there and then, they both fall asleep.

 

*

Zayn takes the longest to be convinced. Niall is wary for a while, and even insists on giving them both a horribly detailed Powerpoint about safe sex and BDSM (neither Harry or Louis admit it, but it’s actually kind of helpful – and certainly very informative about Niall’s own sex life, given how unsubtle he is about glancing at Zayn when he details the proper use of handcuffs and ice cream), but he soon accepts, at least on the surface, that Harry is getting better and Louis is wiser about what he can handle.

   Zayn, though, Zayn still scowls at Harry whenever he sits down to lunch with them; still won’t leave Louis alone with him in the club; still texts him every five minutes while they’re on dates asking if he’s OK.

   And they both understand, so neither of them ever complain.

   It’s not until a month later, when Zayn happens to accidentally eavesdrop on Harry and Louis making out in an empty classroom; hears how the second Louis says ‘Stop’, Harry pulls away; that he grudgingly agrees to ease off a little. He’s still twitchy though, so Louis makes sure that the two of them still have some alone time at least once a week to catch up with each other’s lives and check in on the other’s well-being.

   ‘But really, right now, everything’s OK,’ Louis tells his therapist, expertly petting the ears of her soft dog. ‘I know it’s only secondary school and things change at the drop of the hat and neither of us are anywhere near out of the woods yet…but we’re trying. And so far, we’re doing really well.’

   His therapist smiles softly. ‘Sounds like it worked out. But Louis, it’s important to remember that not every person like Harry has that kind of happy ending.’

   Louis nods. ‘I know. The reason it worked out is because he figured out his problem, decided to fix himself, and stuck to it. It was nothing to do with me, really, even if I was the trigger and some part of the motivation. It was down to him. Just like it was down to me to sort myself out. I’m stronger now, you know, and that’s not because of him. If he does hurt me again, if he can’t keep it up and I have to leave him, I’m not going to collapse like I did before. I’m not going to let him destroy me.’

   Her smile widens. ‘That’s a wonderful attitude, Louis.’

   He smiles back.

   He is still scared sometimes, of course he is. You don’t go through what he went through and recover completely, at least not so soon. But whenever he does get scared, he’ll always tell Harry, and Harry will always give him the space (or indeed the affection) he needs, until he feels better.

   And sometimes Louis has to do the same to him, when he cries about his mother’s indifference to him, or he wakes up fighting off a nightmare about Ben or Nick or Flack, or he can’t stand to be touched because it reminds him of a time when he couldn’t say no. Those times are hard for both of them, but they’re learning to work through them together.

   And Louis doesn’t want to jinx it, but he thinks they have a pretty good shot at getting better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so this is the end! thank you so much to everyone who's stuck with the story and enjoyed it, i'm honestly so happy you guys had a positive response to it and if it wasn't for you i would never have made it this far. i just hope you all like how it worked out x
> 
> (also sorry there isn't really a finished plot-line for liam - i feel bad about it now b/c i like him a lot more than i did when i first wrote this...but i couldn't really find a way to put him after the fight with ziall in so let's just say he went to uni, made out with a few boys, realised he was bi, married one of them and bought a house and four dogs. there)


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